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After the attack, the Russian journalist Elena Milashina appeared shaven, and her face was dyed green
Article informationAuthor, Paul KirbyRole, BBC News
2 hours ago
Masked men assaulted prominent investigative journalist Elena Milashina. According to the journalist’s colleagues, while she was traveling to follow up on a court in the Russian Republic of Chechnya, she was severely beaten, and her fingers were broken.
Earlier, Milashina received death threats from the President of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov.
Milashina was accompanied by lawyer Alexander Nemov, who was also targeted in the attack.
The car they were traveling in was stopped after it set off from the local airport heading to the Chechen capital, Grozny, where they were scheduled to attend the verdict hearing in the case of an exiled mother. Because of criticism of Kadyrov.
Later, Zarema Musayeva was sentenced to five and a half years’ imprisonment. Chechen security forces arrested her in January 2022 from her apartment in western Russia, after accusing her of politically motivated crimes.
Lawyer Alexander Nemov said that he and Milashina were ambushed by a group of 10-12 men, while they were 200 meters from Grozny airport.
Elena Milashina, who is in a hospital in the capital, Grozny, told a Chechen human rights official: “It was a classic kidnapping. They first attacked the driver and then threw him out of the car. Then they got into the car. They bent our heads down. Get down on my knees and put a gun to my head.”
Novaya Gazeta, where Milashina works, said she had suffered an internal brain injury and had broken fingers. Her hair was shaved off and her face was sprayed with green pigment.
According to informed sources, lawyer Nemov told the Russian Bar Association: “They threw us on the side of the road and started kicking us in the face, all over the body… They stabbed me in the leg.”
The “Crew” human rights group, which is active against torture, published a picture showing the lawyer being wounded by a knife. The head of the group, Sergey Babints, said the two were beaten with hard plastic pipes.
The Kremlin described the attack as very serious and said it should be investigated. However, the “Morial” organization concerned with the defense of human rights, which is banned in Russia, said, “There is no doubt that the Moscow and Grozny authorities are following the same path.” Morial added that three of the journalist’s fingers were broken in the attack.
The journalist and lawyer are now in a hospital in the neighboring North Ossetia region.
In February 2022, Milashina was forced to leave Russia for a while, after Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov made threats to her, describing her as a “terrorist,” adding, “We have always eliminated terrorists and their accomplices.”
In 2020, Milashina was also attacked, as she was accompanied by a lawyer named Marina Dubrovina.
In her investigative reports, which detail human rights abuses in Chechnya, Milashina follows the footsteps of two women killed for their brave work. In 2006 her Novaya Gazeta columnist Anna Politkovskaya was murdered in Moscow, while her friend, activist Natalia Estemirova, was kidnapped and shot in Grozny.
Last week, on a BBC programme, Milashina said she was fully aware that Kadyrov and his followers could “easily implement” the Chechen president’s death threats.
And she adds: “I got used to these threats. Almost every year, Kadyrov sends threatening letters several times, whether to my address or to my colleagues in the newspaper… He behaves as if he is the owner of the region of Chechnya.”
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Zarema Musayeva was found guilty of fraud and use of force against a policeman, and rights groups say the charges are fabricated.
Ramzan Kadyrov is one of the staunchest supporters of Russian President Vladimir Putin and encouraged Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He has been widely accused of ordering extrajudicial killings, as well as kidnappings and torture.
Last year, Kadyrov sent Chechen forces known as “Kadyrovtsy” to Ukraine, where they are notorious for their brutality. His name has also been linked to the killing of Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov.
In 2007, Putin handed over the presidency of the Republic of South Russia to Kadyrov, three years after the assassination of his father, the president, in 2004.
And when Zarema Musayeva, 53, was arrested last year by Chechen security officers, Kadyrov said the entire family should be either “in prison or underground”.
Musaeva’s three sons have fled Chechnya and have spoken out online about the Chechen president’s human rights abuses. Her husband, the former judge, was also arrested, but he later managed to escape.
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2023-07-04 19:29:18
