HRC "Memorial" gives materials on power agents' crimes to ICRF

Today, the materials gathered by the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial"on the crimes committed, according to human rights defenders, by law enforcement officials in Kabardino-Balkaria, Ingushetia, North Ossetia and Chechnya, were sent to Alexander Bastrykin, Chairman of the Investigatory Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF), to be investigated by the special unit of the ICRF.

On April 18, Alexander Bastrykin signed an order on setting up, within the ICRF, of a specialized unit for investigating the crimes committed by policemen and other law enforcers and power agents.

In the covering letter accompanying the materials gathered by rights activists, Oleg Orlov, Chairman of the Board of the HRC "Memorial", asks to "check the legality and validity of the decisions made by the investigation bodies" on the listed cases.

"In all these cases we see involvement of law enforcers in committing violent crimes – murders, rapes and acts of torture. In all these cases, the perpetrators remain unpunished. In most cases, criminal cases had been initiated but never investigated. Under most of the cases listed in the Appendix, the victims either had sent their complaints to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), or such complaints are in preparation," says Mr Orlov's letter to Mr Bastrykin, which is also quoted in the message of the HRC "Memorial" received by the "Caucasian Knot".

As noted by Oleg Orlov, people turn to the ECtHR because they are desperate to seek justice in Russia. "We believe that in the interests of the overwhelming majority of Russian citizens is to show the opposite – to find and punish those guilty," said the letter.