Ingush activists remind judge about proofs of their innocence

The accusation in the case of the leaders of Ingush protests is refuted by case materials, including billing data and witnesses' testimonies, but the court ignored some of these data and deliberately excluded some of them. This was stated by Bagaudin Khautiev, Musa Malsagov and Malsag Uzhakhov.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that since January 13, 2023, the court has been considering the appeal complaints against the verdicts passed against seven leaders of the protests that occurred in the city of Magas. In July, Magomed Abubakarov, one of the advocates, analyzed and criticized the verdict pointing to the ignored proofs of the convicted oppositionists' innocence and contradictions in the prosecution's version. His client, Barakh Chemurziev, stated that there were factual errors in the verdict.

Bagaudin Khautiev, another convict, has demanded from the prosecutor to provide at least one proof of his guilt, namely, a video, an audio or a message, confirming that he had urged "young people to take part in illegal protest actions."

Khautiev emphasized that in May 2018, when an extremist community was allegedly created, he did not know any of other convicts, except for Ismail Nalgiev and, superficially, Malsag Uzhakhov. The prosecution asserts that the defendants maintained a telephone connection with each other, but there are no proofs for this.

The court has ignored the videos filmed on March 27, 2019, the day when protesters were dispersed. The records show that Musa Malsagov "made incredible efforts" to prevent clashes; he urged everyone not to confront law enforcers, Mr Uzhakhov has pointed out.

The clashes were the result of law enforcers' provocations; they began beating the crowd with truncheons, Ruslan Mutsolgov, a Khautiev's public defender, has stated.