Court upholds fine for Ingush politician Kartoev

The Supreme Court of Ingushetia upheld the decision to fine Vakha Kartoev, the head of the regional branch of the “Civil Initiative” Party, 40,000 roubles for discrediting the Russian army. Vakha Kartoev insists he is not guilty, human rights defenders note.

The “Caucasian Knot” has reported that on April 15, it became known that the Magas District Court fined Vakha Kartoev, the head of the regional branch of the “Civil Initiative” Party, 40,000 roubles, recognizing a pacifist post on the Instagram* page of the party’s branch as discrediting the Russian army. Vakha Kartoev pleaded not guilty, and an appeal was filed against the court decision, his advocate reported.

The Supreme Court (SC) of Ingushetia upheld the fine to Vakha Kartoev for discrediting the Russian armed forces, the team of the former Human Rights Centre (HRC) “Memorial”** reports in the Telegram channel “Polny PTs 2.0” today.

At trial, Vakha Kartoev has stated that the Instagram* page was created during the election campaign in 2021 and since then he has not used it and has not followed posts on it. “His advocate Magomed-Basir Ozdoev stated in the Supreme Court that, according to the Administrative Code of the Russian Federation, a person could be held accountable only under the law in force at the time the offense was committed,” the human rights defenders reported.

However, Judge Adam Archakov considered that the new article was applied against Vakha Kartoev without violations, the human right defenders added.

* On March 21, the Tverskoi Court of Moscow banned the activities in Russia of the Meta Company, owning Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, in connection with extremist activities.

** The organization was included by the Russian Ministry of Justice (MoJ) in the register of NCOs performing the functions of a foreign agent and was liquidated by a court decision.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on May 23, 2022 at 03:20 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.