
Employees
of Chechen apostate "police" have handed over the body of a
21-year-old citizen of the city of Argun
to his relatives. He was kidnapped by armed persons several months ago after he
had been released from a "police" station. The militia asserts that
the young man was killed in the recent armed clash with Mujahideen. However, human rights activists and his
relatives are sure that he fell victim of an extrajudicial execution.
The story
of Alikhan Markuev, 21, a
resident of Argun, became broadly known due to human rights activists and
journalists of the “Novaya Gazeta”. In the end of August, the paper published
an article about the fate of former militant Alikhan Markuev.
The young
man, who was amnestied in 2008, this summer became an object of steadfast
attention of "police". He was repeatedly summoned to interrogations,
tortured and beaten, and at night on August 2, after being released from the
"police" building in Argun, Alikhan was kidnapped by a group of armed
persons in masquerade masks. A week ago, "law enforcers" told his
relatives that Alikhan Markuev was killed in a skirmish that took place in the
Shali District.
“In 2007,
Alikhan Markuev, together with his several friends, went to the forest and
joined militants. His family got under pressure. The Argun authorities even
tried to violently move the militants’ families out of the city. Power agents
rushed into their homes, threatened with execution and demanded to return
children home. Last year, they came back. One of the republic’s TV channels
gave a special report, where Ibragim Temirbaev, head of administration of
Argun, solemnly guaranteed safety to Alikhan Markuev. As far as I know, after
his return from the forest he worked at different construction sites and lived
a normal life. Power agents had no claims to him,” one of Chechen human rights
activists, familiar with this case, told the “Caucasian Knot”.
According
to his story, apostate "policemen" started persecuting Alikhan this
summer, after several martyr operations in the capital and other cities.
One of them was Ruslan Mukhadiev, a native of Argun, who went to join militants
in summer of 2007 together with Markuev.
Department of monitoring
KC