Chechen authorities vow to comment on Kadyrov's critics

Members of the team of the head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, are no longer going to comment on the situation with his critics to journalists, and will not react to the statements made by opponents of regional authorities, Akhmed Dudaev, the Minister of Information of Chechnya, has stated.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that in December 2021, a number of critics of Chechen authorities reported kidnappings of their relatives; in particular, such report was made by Abubakar Yangulbaev, a former lawyer of the "Committee against Torture" (CaT)*. On January 20, it became known about the abduction of his mother, Zarema Musaeva, by Chechen law enforcers. A number of Chechen officials and law enforcers pronounced threats against the Yangulbaev family.

On February 1, Adam Delimkhanov, an adviser to the head of Chechnya, posted a video on the Instagram, in which he threatened to execute the members of the Yangulbaev family.

"I mean several rootless, dishonest renegades who have settled in foreign countries and today are insulting the honour and dignity of their relatives and all the peoples living in the territory of the Chechen Republic; they insult all the members of Kadyrov’s team," Minister Dudaev said in his video posted on the Instagram.

The authorities of Chechnya "would no longer react to any groundless and unjustified statements of these dregs of society," he has stressed.

"Their relatives and fellow villagers have announced them to be illegitimate ... I ask journalists not to try contacting members of Kadyrov's team with requests to react to statements of these dummies," Mr Dudaev has stated.