Chechnya holds rally against release of Budanov

A mass protest action is now held in the capital of Chechnya in the context of early relief from the colony of former Colonel Yuri Budanov, guilty of murdering Chechen girl Elza Kungaeva, 17, in March 2000.

The news about the forthcoming Colonel Budanov's early relief from imprisonment caused a resolute public protest in Chechnya. "Budanov's early relief is a challenge to justice, since they release the person, who had committed, through abuse of his service position, a gravest crime, having brutally murdered an innocent girl," Ombudsman in Chechnya Nurdi Nukhazhiev said in this connection to the "Kommersant" newspaper.

Mr Nukhazhiev has added in his interview to the "Echo Moskvy" Radio Station that "it's too early for Budanov to feel happy", since "the human rights community possesses information about the evil deeds committed by him and his subordinates in the course of the counterterrorist operation in Chechnya."

Nurdi Nukhazhiev has expressed hope that Budanov will be convicted to life imprisonment.

Today, a mass protest action against release of Colonel Budanov has started after 1 p.m. in the Journalists' Mini-Park, opposite the House of Press in Grozny. The participants are representing human rights and public organizations of Chechnya; they are members of regional branches of political parties and students of local higher schools.

"Budanov got behind bars just because this case had received broad publicity and became very resonant. Nobody knows how many such persons had committed similar 'feats' in the territory of our republic and escaped liability," said Aslambek Apaev, expert of the Moscow Helsinki Group for Northern Caucasus.
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