ECtHR finds Russia involved in two disappearances in Chechnya

The federal agents who took away in 2002 brothers Magomed-Salekh and Magomed-Ali Ilyasov failed to present their IDs, behaved rudely and aggressively and threatened their family members. This was reported by their mother Zhugurkhan Ilyasovа, who was defined as victim by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).

Let us remind you that on June 10, 2010, the ECtHR found the Russian Federation responsible for disappearance in 2002 of two residents of Chechnya - Magomed-Salekh and Magomed-Ali Ilyasov.

The applicant on the case was their mother - Zhugurkhan Ilyasovа, a resident of Katyr-Yurt village of the Chechen Republic, whose interests were represented by lawyers of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial" and the European Human Rights Advocacy Centre (EHRAC) from London.

According to Ms Ilyasova, early in the morning on November 12, 2002, her sons were detained by federal power agents who rushed into their house. When she tried to clear out the reasons of detention, one of the agents struck her with the butt of his sub-machine gun.

When they started driving Ilyasova's third son - Magomed-Said - out of the house, she fainted; and they released him asking to go and calm his mother. Then, his brothers were taken away in an armoured troop-carrier to some unknown place, the HRC "Memorial" reports.

Several days after the incident the woman managed to find out that her sons were kept at the Achkhoy-Martan ROVD (District Interior Division). However, when Ilyasovа brought there clothes and food for her children, employees of the ROVD refused to take the parcel saying that Magomed-Ali and Magomed-Salekh were not there.

Since November 2002 on, the applicant, her relatives and friends have been trying to find Ilyasov brothers and make those guilty of their disappearance responsible.

A criminal case was initiated on the fact of kidnapping of Magomed-Ali and Magomed-Salekh under Article 126, part 2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ("kidnapping"), which was repeatedly stopped and restarted, and transferred from instance to instance.

Having decided that the investigation held by Russian authorities was hopeless, in 2006 Ilyasovа addressed the ECtHR.