Native of Chechnya achieves cancellation of his deportation from France

A court in Paris has satisfied the complaint of a native of Chechnya against the decision of the French Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) to deport him to Russia, admitting that the man was in danger of being tortured in Russia. This was reported by Mairbek Vachagaev, a historian and journalist living in Europe.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that in November 2022, human rights organizations sent a note to the UN on the inadmissibility of deporting Chechen refugees from France.

Over the past five years, the attitude towards immigrants from Chechnya has worsened in France; it is more and more difficult for them to receive the refugee status; and there are more and more reasons for depriving them of this status, the "Memorial" Centre for Human Rights Defence. In 2017, France passed a law that empowered the MIA head to monitor those who may be suspected of creating a threat to the French state security. In particular, even a handshake of two Chechens can be treated as suspicious by authorities.

In 2017, France sharply worsened its attitude towards political asylum seekers from Chechnya. By December 2017, it was known about 10 people from Chechnya under threat of extradition on the basis of only suspicion of their links with radical groupings, said Sasha Kulaeva, the head of the Eastern Europe and Central Asia division of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH).

In May 2021, French human rights defenders stated that the country's authorities were deliberately violating the international rules by deporting natives of Chechnya to Russia, where they face threats of torture and ill-treatment.