Human rights defenders alarmed by Zarema Musaeva’s state of health

Zarema Musaeva does not participate in the investigating proceedings because of her poor health state, and there is no medical unit in the special detention centre where she is being kept, her son Abubakar Yangulbaev says. Human rights defenders applied to the court with the demand to release Zarema Musaeva from arrest because of her poor health, the “Committee Against Torture”* reports.

The “Caucasian Knot” has reported that on January 28, Chechen law enforcers presented to lawyers a letter signed by Zarema Musaeva, in which she refused the services of an advocate. The human rights defenders and the son of Zarema Musaeva say she was subjected to pressure.

Abubakar Yangulbaev mentions there have already been cases when detainees refused advocates who were sent to Chechnya from human rights organizations. The son of Zarema Musaeva notes that even the refusal of an advocate could not be an obstacle for the human rights defenders in their attempt to visit his mother.

Lawyers challenged the refusal for advocates to visit Zarema Musaeva. They also appealed against the court’s decision to arrest Zarema Musaeva for 15 days in an administrative case.

* The “Committee Against Torture” (CaT) was included by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) of Russia in the register of NCOs-foreign agents in 2015. In this regard, leaders liquidated the organization and created a new legal entity: the “Committee for the Prevention of Torture”, which was also included in the list of foreign agents, and the organization was closed. At present, the “Committee Against Torture” operates as an unregistered public association.