Murders and abductions in Chechnya in the past three weeksRuslan Isayev, North Caucasus - Five people were killed and eighteen abducted in various parts of Chechnya within the past three weeks, according to the Nazran office of the human rights center Memorial. During this same period, two mass graves, containing four bodies, were discovered.
However, this is not a complete picture of what is happening in Chechnya. As one of the Memorial members Usam Baysayev said, this reflects only a third of the actual number as human rights defenders don’t receive information from all areas of the republic.
The most dangerous place continues to be Grozny, where explosions and shootings are ongoing, and murders and/or arrests occur almost on a daily basis during "special operations".
A few days ago, in the Staropromyslovski district of the Chechen capital, two dead men were found in a pit. According to preliminary information, the victims are people from the outskirts of Grozny who had been detained during a "mopping-up operation" carried out by Russian federal forces.
On April 15, the bodies of three pupils, all of whom had been machine gunned, were found in an outlying district of Grozny. An investigation is underway, but no one seems to know why or who killed these teenagers, one of whom was a Russian.
(A,E/T) |
