13:34, 10 July 2017

HRC gets law enforcers' answers to request about gays in Chechnya

Mikhail Fedotov, Chairman of the Human Rights Council under the Russian President. Photo: http://president-sovet.ru/presscenter/news/read/3464/

The Presidential Human Rights Council (HRC) has received from the General Prosecutor's Office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) the answers to their complaints about the persecution of LGBT community members in Chechnya. This was reported by Mikhail Fedotov, the chair of the Presidential HRC. According to him, human rights defenders will keep the situation under control.

On May 10, Mikhail Fedotov visited Grozny, and at a meeting with Ramzan Kadyrov, he raised a topic on the persecution of gays in Chechnya.

Earlier, on July 6, Tatiana Moskalkova, High Commissioner for Human Rights in the Russian Federation, also reported that she received an interim response to her inquiry to the Investigating Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF) on the persecution of LGBT community in Chechnya. According to the ICRF's answer, the investigators "did not reveal any facts confirming violent actions against such persons." Meanwhile, Tatiana Moskalkova announced her intention to request investigators to write a clarifying answer concerning 24 surnames received from the newspaper "Novaya Gazeta".

It should be noted that gays are persecuted not only in Chechnya, but also in other regions of Northern Caucasus.

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