Inquiry launched into disappearance of Chechen Seda Suleimanova

In response to requests demanding to investigate the disappearance of Seda Suleimanova, a native of Chechnya, the Investigating Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF) has announced the start of a criminal investigation, the SK SOS Crisis Group* has informed.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on August 23, 2023, law enforcers came to the 26-year-old Seda Suleimanova who had fled from Chechnya to Saint Petersburg, and her bridegroom and detained them, explaining that the girl was suspected of stealing some jewellery at home. Later, the Seda was sent to Grozny, where she was handed over to her relatives. Her advocates were not allowed to visit their client. In February and March this year, Lena Patyaeva, one of Seda's friends, held protest actions recalling that nothing had been known about Suleimanova's fate for more than six months. On March 20, human rights defenders reported that none of the agencies where requests about Seda's fate were sent checked the information about her possible murder.

Human rights defenders have expressed gratitude to everyone who is demanding an inquiry into what happened to Suleimanova. "Any progress in this case occurs thanks to you," says the Telegram channel of the SK SOS Crisis Group*.

"Everything you did – signing appeals, spreading information about Seda's disappearance – is not senseless. It brings results. We must not drop our hands up and have no right to give up. For the sake of Seda and other girls and women suffering from domestic violence, sent to aggressors' hands with the consent of the state," the human rights project "Marem" wrote in its Telegram channel.

*Included by the Russian Ministry of Justice (MoJ) into the register of foreign agents.