Ingushetian authorities deny their involvement in extrajudicial executions and kidnappings

The authorities of Ingushetia have no attitude to the murders and kidnappings committed in the territory under their governance, the leaders of this Republic declared at the press conference held on July 1 at the RIA "Novosti" in Moscow. As they said, if the Republic still has this sort of human rights violations, the guilt is on the power structures subordinated to the federal centre.

The meeting with journalists was attended by Tamara Khautieva, deputy chair of the Parliament of Ingushetia; Hadzhibikar Ortskhanov, MP and adviser to President Murad Zyazikov; Vasily Likhachov, representative at the Federation Council of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation from the National Assembly of the Republic of Ingushetia and deputy chairman of the Committee of the Federation Council for international issues; Alexander Brod, a member of Public Chamber of the Russian Federation and director of the Moscow Human Rights Bureau (MHRB); and Natalia Rykova, executive director of the MHRB.

"Since the targeted special operations were spent conducted by federal power agents, certainly there were violations," the Ombudsman of Ingushetia has not doubt. However, in the opinion of Karim-Sultan Kokurkhaev, human rights organizations and mass media often prematurely and without clear understanding, accuse them of murdering innocent people: "One can't agree with what they publish: so many people are killed, so many executions committed. They just take the total count of casualties, but there are for sure militants among them, and neither the investigation, nor the court has established that not militants had been killed, but innocent people had suffered."