Advocate states torture of employee of KBR’s MfE

Anzor Shibzukhov, an employee of the Ministry for Emergencies (MfE) of the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic (KBR), accused of aiding militants, was tortured during the investigation, said his advocate.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported referring to investigators, that in 2013-2014, Anzor Shibzukhov, a resident of Baksan, acting on instruction of Ruslan Goplachev, a member of an illegal armed formation (IAF), who was then wanted, shadowed power agents and informed militants about their routes. Investigators believe that the defendant had illegally stored ammunition, explosives and drugs in his house.

Shibzukhov was detained on January 30, 2016, and is now is kept in SIZO (pre-trial prison) in Nalchik, said his sister Zita Shibzuhova, who added that Anzor’s relatives associate his prosecution with his religious beliefs.

The Shibzuhov’s confessions, according to Ramazan Uzuev, his advocate, were obtained under torture.

Mr Uzuev has explained that in 2013, the investigator failed to reveal, when checking Shibzukhov for involvement in aiding members of illegal armed formations (IAFs), no crime attributes in his actions, while his client from the beginning had been held as a witness.

Now, some secret witness has been introduced into Shibzuhov’s case; and the whole charge is based on the testimony of this witness, said the advocate.

The defendant’s statement of February 4 reads that law enforcers had planted drugs and ammunition into Anzor Shibzuhov’s house, which was searched on January 30.

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