Defence treats law enforcers' testimonies in Gadjiev's case as unconvincing

At the trial of the case of Abdulmumin Gadjiev, a journalist of the "Chernovik" (Draft) weekly, law enforcers acted as witnesses; however, they did not see any actions imputed to Gadjiev and failed to present any proofs of money transfer to terrorists, the Gadjiev's defence asserts.

The “Caucasian Knot” has reported that according to investigators, Abdulmumin Gadjiev, a correspondent of the newspaper “Chernovik”, acting jointly with Abubakar Rizvanov, the head of the "Ansar" charity fund, and Kemal Tambiev, raised 68 million roubles and 200,000 US dollars for terrorists under the pretext of helping Muslims.

he first witness, Abduldjapar Biyarslanov, a deputy head of the Criminal Investigation Department of the Dagestani Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA), said that in 2017 "a number of persons involved in financing terrorist activities were identified, in particular, the Dagestani religious figure, Israil Akhmednabiev." The witness claimed that Abdulmumin Gadjiev "had ensured Akhmednabiev's activities through covering them through the newspaper's editorial office," but he failed to specify the publications that had covered this, what they were about and in what year they appeared in the newspaper pages.

The second witness, Eldar Shtibekov, a senior operative agent of the Dagestani FSB branch, said that Abdulmumin Gadjiev "was aware of Akhmednabiev's criminal activities."

Answering advocates' questions, Shtibekov said that Gadjiev was campaigning "through the weekly". Like Biyarslanov, he could not answer the clarifying questions.

Both witnesses stated that they were not eyewitnesses to the defendants' criminal actions. In this regard, the defence will ask the court to critically treat their testimonies, Anna Serdyukova, one of Gadjiev's advocates, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent. "The witnesses failed to provide any proofs of any money transfers for financing terrorism, not a single transaction, and not a single method of transfer," Ms Serdyukova has stated.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on September 9, 2021 at 08:42 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.