Wife of Issa Khashagulgov, suspected of relations with terrorists, meets Thomas Hammarberg

Hotel "Assa" in Nazran was the venue of the meeting of Ingush rights defenders and relatives of missing persons with Thomas Hammarberg, Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe.

Within his visit to the Caucasus, the Commissioner came to Ingushetia to see the current situation with human rights there. After his meeting with the authorities of the republic, Mr Hammarberg spoke personally with the victims, whose relatives disappeared or were killed by power agents after detention.

Among others, the meeting was attended by Magomed Mutsolgov, head of the NGO "Mashr", and Timur Akiev, head of the local branch of the HRC "Memorial". Akiev acquainted Thomas Hammarberg with Pyatimat Khashagulgova.

Earlier, Ms Khashagulgova had placed her video appeal on the Internet, where she stated that her husband had nothing to do with the terror act in Vladikavkaz and told about law enforcers' illegal actions against her family.

Pyatimat narrated it all to Hammarberg, and Mutsolgov and Akiev supplemented her story with the facts of investigators' pressure on Khashagulgov and his relatives. Akiev noted that the story is a good example of how authorities cavalierly trample upon human rights. The meeting lasted for two hours.

"It seemed to me that Hammarberg knew our story. Maybe because several days ago I had sent a letter to the European Parliament, to Heidi Hautala. Maybe this information had been already presented to Hammarberg," said Pyatimat.

The Commissioner listened to Pyatimat and asked her and rights defenders to draw up a written appeal and forward it to him for consideration with all the documents pertaining to the case.

Thomas Hammarberg also promised that his staff will consider the situation surrounding the Khashagulgov's case in the near future and react to it.