Russia denies involvement of its militaries in death of schoolchildren in Chechnya

Russia does not admit involvement of state officials in the death of two pupils from a shell in Chechnya in 2000. The Strasbourg Court (ECtHR) is accusing the Russian Federation of inefficient investigation of this case.

Russia, as explained by a human rights defender, who knows the details of considering the case in Strasbourg, denied any involvement of state officials in the death of the boys.

According to the expert, the state also said that "it will be possible to state any involvement of public servants in the death of schoolchildren only after the end of the investigation, during which all the circumstances of what happened should be established."

Besides, according to the rights defender, the authorities had reported that on the day, when the schoolchildren perished, a subdivision of federal forces was shelled near Urus-Martan by militants "with the use of a flame thrower." "The government had supposed that the schoolchildren could be killed by an explosion of the shell fired by the militants," he has noted.

He added that, according to the Court, the "obvious investigatory actions were not fulfilled." "There were a lot of witnesses, but they were not questioned on the circumstances of the incident. The explosive device that blew up there was not established by the available fragments. Relatives of the casualties argued that it was an artillery shell, but no examination to confirm or refute these allegations was carried out," he told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

According to Vanessa Cogan, executive director of the "Legal Initiative for Russia", the militaries, who, in the opinion of the applicants had been involved in the death of the boys, said that on that day Russian troops did not use the weapon, which killed the children.