Observer of "Chernovik" reports about search of his house

In the course of a search, conducted in the house of Umar Butaev, a Dagestani blogger and an observer of the newspaper "Chernovik", policemen confiscated his laptop and phone. His colleagues speak about the pressure, associated with the Butaev's active journalism.

The search was conducted on April 17 by about 10 policemen.

"Almost all of them were armed. When I came out, they presented a statement that within a criminal case, my house must be searched," Butaev wrote in his page on the Facebook.

According to law enforcers, the pretext for a search was in Butaev's traced correspondence on the Internet with a certain person.

"The statement said that my house should be searched, because I allegedly keep links with militants (after the search, when I came to the police station, made it became clear that these militants had been dead for more than six months)," explains Butaev.

He added that policemen found nothing forbidden and suspicious, and promised to return my items within 10 days.

In his articles in the "Chernovik", Butaev often raises critical acute social issues on problems in public health care, and distribution of land. Earlier, at the police station of the village of Shamkhal, Butaev had been already asked to stop his journalistic activities.

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.