HRC treats Rajapov's and Tsetievs' case as example of judges' and investigators' "frank pledge"

The case of the natives of Chechnya Khamid Rajapov and Tsetiev brothers, accused of beating and attempted murder of employees of the Ministry for Emergencies (MfE), shows the need of creating some independent institution to deal with checking complaints against law enforcers and investigators, the members of the Russian Presidential Human Rights Council (HRC) believe. They addressed this initiative to President Putin at their meeting on December 9.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that the meeting raised a number of issues related to regions of Southern Russia. In particular, HRC members discussed with the president the practice of putting residents of Dagestan on the so-called "prophylactic registry"; the pressure on the "Ecological Watch for Northern Caucasus"; the threat of land alienation in the Caucasian Reserve; complaints of Kuban farmers about raiding; murders of Imams in the Stavropol Territory; the works towards the elimination of consequences of the Ossetian-Ingush conflict; and the case of the Stavropol student Kerimov.

Evgeny Myslovskiy, a member of the HRC and the president of the "Anti-Mafia" regional public fund to counter organized crime and corruption, recalled the case of Khamid Rajapov and Tsetiev brothers, natives of Chechnya.

Khamid Rajapov, Said-Magomed and Khusein Tsetiev were detained in September 2014 and accused of beating up and attempting to kill MfE employees in the area of the settlement of Vnukovo, near Moscow. However, according to the defence, the defendants possess an alibi.

Mr Myslovskiy called outrageous the fact that investigators, judges and prosecutors, involved in the case, demonstrate their unwillingness to correct their own mistakes.

It is in such situations, he has explained, that we need an authorized body, which could stop the arbitrariness.

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.