HRC "Memorial" warns of fabricated evidence against relatives of sentenced Kurchaloi residents

Law enforcers seized mobile phones from relatives of 14 residents of Chechnya, sentenced for involvement in the ranks of militants and registered Telegram accounts to those phone numbers. Human rights defenders do not exclude that this is preparation for fabricating criminal cases against mobile phone owners.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that in January 2017, 14 people were detained in the Kurchaloi District. Later, they were sentenced to 9.5-10.5 years of imprisonment in a case on terrorism.

According to the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial", on October 23 and 24, in Kurchaloi and the village of Tsotsi-Yurt in the Kurchaloi District, Chechen law enforcers detained relatives of 14 local residents who were detained in 2017.

The law enforcers seized mobile phones from all the detainees, and their houses were searched without court warrants. On October 25, almost everyone was released after questioning. Most of the detainees never got their mobile phones back. On October 27, Telegram accounts were registered to the numbers of at least five seized mobile phones. The appropriate notifications got people from the contact lists of the seized mobile phones' owners. According to the today's post on the website of the HRC "Memorial", the corresponding screenshots are at its disposal.

The human rights defenders do not exclude that the above Telegram accounts have been opened for posting extremist materials in them and further using for fabrication of criminal cases against mobile phone owners.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on October 30, 2020 at 04:45 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.