Dagestani police officers charged with kidnapping

The Dagestani Prosecutor's Office has finished an investigation into the criminal case against two officers of the Organized Crime Unit: the head of the anti-kidnapping department, Colonel Imamudin Temirbulatov, and Major Ayvar Akhmedov of the same department. The investigators' version is that they are involved in abductions of people in Dagestan, in particular in the abduction of Djamal Gamidov, a nephew of Dagestani Minister of Finance Abdusamad Gamidov and son of Gamid Gamidov, the minister of finance killed in 1996.

Djamal Gamidov was abducted in Makhachkala in July 2000. He was found in a deserted quarters in the Dagestani town of Khasavyurt in December 2003. Imamudin Temirbulatov and Ayvar Akhmedov were arrested not far from that place on the same day. Temirbulatov personally worked on Djamal Gamidov's case. According to the investigators' version, he along with Akhmedov redeemed the child from the criminals using money collected by Djamal's relatives and appropriated a part of the sum. The defendants have another version. They say the child was released without a ransom as a result of long negotiations and other special measures.