The Chechen conflict in "Amnesty International Report 2001"
The following are selected parts of "Amnesty International 2001 Report - Russian Federation" which concern the conflict in Chechnya (PW editors).
The Chechen conflict
The Russian authorities claimed that the situation in Chechnya had normalized following the scaling down of military activities in the first quarter of 2000. However, the human rights crisis in Chechnya continued. There were frequent reports that Russian forces indiscriminately bombed and shelled civilian areas. Chechen civilians, including medical personnel, continued to be the target of military attacks by Russian forces. Hundreds of Chechen civilians and prisoners of war were extrajudicially executed. Journalists and independent monitors continued to be refused access to Chechnya. According to reports, Chechen fighters frequently threatened, and in some cases killed, members of the Russian-appointed civilian administration and executed Russian captured soldiers.
At least 60 civilians were summarily executed in the Noviye Aldy suburb of the Chechen capital, Grozny, by Russian forces during a ''cleansing operation'' on 5 February.
In March Russian forces launched an attack on a group of up to 60 civilians, mostly women and children, in the village of Samashki. The villagers had been promised a ''safe corridor'' for one day to allow them to collect food. Despite these assurances, the group came under artillery attack and at least three women were killed and five were wounded.
Andrey Babitsky, a Russian war correspondent working for Radio Liberty, went missing in Chechnya while trying to leave the capital Grozny. It later emerged that he had been arrested by the Russian military authorities and was being held incommunicado. On 3 February the Russian authorities announced that Andrey Babitsky had been handed over to Chechen fighters, reportedly in exchange for Russian soldiers held by Chechen forces. On 25 February Andrey Babitsky was found in detention in the Dagestan capital, Makhachkala, from where he was released and flown to Moscow following the intervention of Vladimir Putin.
Andrey Babitsky stated that he had been detained in the Chernokozovo ''filtration camp'' where he had been beaten with truncheons by Russian guards and heard the screams of other detainees, including a woman, being tortured. He also said that the Russian authorities had handed him over to unidentified Chechens, whom he believed to be collaborating with the Russian authorities, against his will.
Torture in 'filtration camps'
Russian forces continued to detain people in Chechnya at checkpoints and in the territories under their control. Most people were detained during so-called ''cleansing operations'' in newly occupied towns or during identity checks on civilian convoys travelling from Chechnya to neighbouring Ingushetia. People apprehended by Russian forces were sent to secret ''filtration camps'' where they were held without access to their relatives, lawyers or the outside world. Survivors of ''filtration camps'' stated that torture was routine and systematic. There were numerous reports of detainees being raped, beaten with hammers and clubs, given electric shocks or tear gassed. There were also reports that some detainees had their teeth filed down or were beaten around both ears simultaneously to burst the ear-drums. Senior Russian officials continued to deny the existence of ''filtration camps'' and to claim that no detainees in Chechnya were tortured.
Witnesses stated that a 14-year-old girl, originally from Urus-Martan, died in detention in Chernokozovo at the beginning of the year, allegedly as a result of torture; she had been repeatedly raped by Russian guards. She had reportedly been detained at a checkpoint while travelling on a bus. According to the witnesses, the girl was among 60 women held together in cell number 25 in Chernokozovo, who were subjected to beatings by the guards.
Musa (not his real name), a former detainee in Chernokozovo, stated that a 16-year-old boy called Albert, originally from the village of Davydenko, was brought to his cell after being gang-raped and severely beaten by prison guards. One of his ears had been cut off. Musa believed that up to 10 men were raped in the camp during his 21-day detention. His other cellmates included a man whose hands had been severely burned by prison guards with cigarette lighters and a 17-year-old youth whose teeth had been filed with a metal file and whose lips were shredded, leaving him unable to eat, drink or speak.
Internally displaced people
An estimated 300,000 civilians remained displaced by the conflict, both inside Chechnya and in neighbouring republics. About half were in Ingushetia living in very poor conditions; many lacked adequate shelter and sanitation. Arbitrary official restrictions prevented most from travelling to other territories of the Russian Federation, placing a major strain on Ingushetia's own population.
Persecution of Chechens
Chechens and other people from the Caucasus continued to be arbitrarily detained, ill-treated and tortured in Moscow and other parts of the Russian Federation. In Moscow, Mayor Yury Luzhkov used unconstitutional measures, including the so-called propiska (residence permit) system, to expel thousands of Chechens and to deny registration to internally displaced Chechens who had fled the conflict zone. Reports continued to be received that in some cases police fabricated criminal charges against Chechens and planted drugs or weapons on them. In Moscow alone, more than 50 Chechens were sentenced to prison terms despite compelling evidence that the charges against them had been fabricated.
Abuses by Chechen fighters
Dozens of civilian hostages were reportedly held by armed Chechen groups. Two former hostages said they witnessed the killing in February of Vladimir Yatsina, a Russian news agency photojournalist who had been kidnapped in Ingushetia by a Chechen group in July 1999.
The international community
The Russian authorities refused to allow the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights to visit a number of secret ''filtration camps'' made public by AI. The reasons given were bad weather and security problems.
In April, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe voted to suspend the Russian delegation's voting rights and called on its Committee of Ministers to immediately invoke a procedure for the suspension of Russia's membership.
AI urged the UN Commission on Human Rights to call for an international investigation. However, the Commission called for the establishment of a national, broad-based, independent commission, in accordance with recognized international standards; none of the bodies established by the Russian authorities measured up to these standards.
The full version of the Amnesty International 2001 Report concerning the Russian Federation is available
here (Amnesty International's site).
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