Dagestan: witnesses are interrogated on "execution list"

Today, Svetlana Isaeva, chair of the human rights organization "Mothers of Dagestan for Human Rights", a figurant in the so-called "execution list" disseminated in the form of leaflets in early September in Dagestan, was summoned to the local prosecutor's office for interrogation.

Ms Isaeva said to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that Ustar Elikhanov, an inspector for especially important cases of the investigatory committee at the prosecutor's office (ICPO) of Dagestan, talked to her.

She told him in the course of the two-hour long interrogation that personally she has no enemies, but in her opinion certainly some power agents were behind the leaflets.

She has added that the people mentioned in the list should actually worry about their lives. "What we see in Chechnya, Ingushetia and Dagestan, indicates that human rights activity is very dangerous. I have no firearms, bodyguards, nobody 'backs me up'; my colleagues or I can be assassinated just to intimidate ordinary citizens and the society," Ms Isaeva said.

On November 13, under the same criminal case, another inspector for especially important cases of the ICPO - Anvar Ukmasov - interrogated journalists of the Dagestan-based weekly "Novoe Delo (New Business) Akhmednabi Akhmednabiev and Natalia Krainova, also figurants of the "execution list". Mr Akhmednabiev told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that at his interrogation also said that he did not know the authors of the leaflets, but believed, by some attributes, that they were active or former law enforcers of Dagestan. Akhmednabi told the inspector that he has no personal enemies; but he named a person, negatively predisposed to him - Garun Kurbanov, minister on national policy, information and foreign relations of Dagestan, who stated publicly at the recent meeting with President of Dagestan that the journalist and his weekly "Novoe Delo" were traitors of Dagestan.

He also added in his talk to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that he plans to address the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) of Dagestan with the request either to ensure his security or to allow him to buy a firearm.