A protest rally against arbitrariness of the military was held by 20 local rights organisations in the Chechen capital Grozny after three villagers were killed by Russian servicemen on November 16, the Interfax reports.
Representatives of about 20 human rights organizations, members of youth organizations and Grozny college students took part in the demonstration. Protesters demanded to ban the use of armored vehicles in Chechnya, to remove unnecessary checkpoints and to bring the military servicemen who commit crimes to justice..
Two residents of the Kurchaloi district and one resident of the Staraya Sunzha village near Grozny were killed last week by men wearing camouflage uniform and masks. The killers detained Yusup Usmanov, Khusain Akhmadov and Jambulat Dushayev on the outskirts of Staraya Sunzha late at night, forced them to lie on the ground and shot them in the head. Later the Russian Defense Ministry admitted that its servicemen had been responsible for the incident. They have already been detained and confessed to killing the civilians.
“Analysis shows that servicemen perpetrate severe crimes against civilians in Chechnya without fear of retribution,” head of the Chechen president’s department for constitutional rights of Russian citizens in Chechnya Nurdi Nukhazhiyev believes.
“Servicemen deployed in Chechnya drink to excess and behave badly. Should they decide to kill civilians, they do so. This situation will not change until soldiers go back to barracks and start training. Any lasting peace is, until then, out of the question,” he said dismissing numerous reports about the “end of the war in Chechnya”.
