Court leaves Ashikov brothers from Dagestan under arrest for other three months

The Supreme Court (SC) of Dagestan extended until September 28 the terms of arrest of brothers Raip and Ziyavudin Ashikov, as well as Omar Abdurashidov.

The “Caucasian Knot” has reported that Raip Ashikov, the former chief of the Makhachkala police and his brother Ziyavudin Ashikov, the former acting chief of the Kaspiysk police department, are accused of financing terrorism and an attempted murder of a law enforcer. In December 2020, Raip Ashikov was also suspected of abuse of power.

Earlier, Raip Ashikov has pleaded not guilty and claimed that he started to face problems after he had a conflict with a top-ranking official. Omar Abdurashidov claims that law enforcers tortured him to force him to testify against Raip Ashikov. Relatives of Omar Abdurashidov and the Ashikov brothers held repeated protest actions and insisted that the case against them had been falsified. According to the Raip Ashikov’s relatives, he became a figurant of the criminal case after he had uncovered multibillion-rouble embezzlements during the investigation into the case against the Dagestani branch of the “Rosselkhozbank”. In October 2020, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) communicated the complaint of Raip Ashikov about his unjustified detention and the constant extension of the pre-trial restriction measure.