Memorial: Growing Number of Young Chechens Joining Rebels
Publication: North Caucasus Weekly
May 22, 2009 01:43 PM
Category: North Caucasus Weekly, The Caucasus, North Caucasus
The
Memorial human rights group says that pressure by law enforcement
bodies in Chechnya on youth in the republic has only increased since
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev officially announced an end to the
ten-year-long counter-terrorist operation in the republic last month,
and that this pressure is driving more and more young Chechens to join
the rebels.
Kavkazky Uzel on May 20 quoted Memorial as saying
that Anzor Bashaev, a young resident of the village of Shalazhi in
Chechnya’s Achkhoi-Martan district, disappeared from his home on May 7
and has not returned since. According to the human rights group, two
days before his disappearance, Bashaev had been detained and severely
beaten by security forces. Bashaev said he had been detained in
connection with the disappearance of another local resident, named
Asmerzaev. Relatives of Asmerzaev claim that he was abducted by rebel
forces but other local residents said he went with them voluntarily.
Memorial
reported that Bashaev had probably also gone off to join the rebels,
noting that two of his cousins, Rizvan and Alkhazur, had already done
so, and that Alkhazur had served as a rebel recruiter. Memorial
reported that eight young people from Shalazhi have joined the rebels
in the last six months, including another pair of cousins, Adam and
Islam Shakhbiev, and 22-year-old Baudi Akhtakhanov, who was detained
and severely tortured by security forces last November. Another young
resident of Shalazhi, Alvi Khamzaev, was detained by security
forces—reportedly officers of the Urus-Martan district police—in late
April and tortured, but was freed after his relatives managed to track
him down.
“It seemed to us that the cancellation of the
counter-terrorist operation would be another step toward normalizing
the situation in the republic, but what we see now indicates the exact
opposite,” Memorial quoted Shalazhi residents as saying. They were also
quoted as saying that security checkpoints are periodically set up at
entrances leading into the village from the villages of Orekhovo (also
in Achkhoi-Martan district) and Gekhi (in Urus-Martan district). They
also said that their village is frequently buzzed by low-flying
helicopters. In addition, Shalazhi residents were warned in mosques
that they risk being shot without warning if they go off into the woods
to join the militants.
Kavkazky Uzel quoted residents of
Chechnya as saying they fear that the current security operations will
result in innocent civilians being detained instead of rebels. The
website quoted a representative of a Chechen non-governmental
organization as expressing concern over recent harsh statements made by
Kadyrov and other Chechen officials, including Chechen Interior
Minister Ruslan Alkhanov and his deputy, Ali Tagirov, especially
threats made against relatives of militants. The NGO representative
said Tagirov had openly threatened “accomplices of the bandits” on
local television and essentially ordered his subordinates to begin
large-scale cleansing operations (zachistki): to inspect every home,
find people living in them who are not legally registered there, check
everyone who visits homes, and so on. “The subordinates of the top
leadership normally take such things as a guide for action and start to
do anything they want,” Kavkazky Uzel quoted the NGO representative as
saying.
According to Memorial, 34 people in Chechnya were
abducted during January-April 2009—an increase over the same period in
2008, when only seven people were abducted (a total of 42 people were
abducted in Chechnya in 2008). The human rights group noted that 20 of
those kidnapped during the first four months of this year were
residents of the village of Dargo in Chechnya’s Vedeno district. It
also reported that 27 of the 34 people kidnapped in the republic in the
first four months of 2009 were subsequently freed, while two were found
dead, two disappeared without a trace and three were found in pre-trial
detention and under investigation.
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