Human Rights Watch Misses One of Main Problems in Ingushetia, Portal Six Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, January 20 – In its annual report, US-based Human Rights Watch focuses on two of the three main problems in Ingushetia, Portal Six says. It describes the persecution of activists and restrictions on the media, but if fails to discuss the pressure on regional NGOs (6portal.ru/posts/human-rights-watch-отметила-факт-репрессий-против-ак/).

            The independent portal says that it has in its possession “numerous documents” about this pressure which it suggests those concerned with human rights should be concerned, given that many demonstrators are dependent on these NGOs and private organizations for their livelihood and even survival.

            Meanwhile, lawyers for Malsag Uzhakhov say that their client has been charged with organizing an extremist community because prosecutors have been unable to produce evidence for the other charges they have brought against him and hope this more serious charge – it carries a ten-year jail term – may prompt him to confess to the others (doshdu.com/protiv-ingushskogo-aktivista-malsaga-uzhahova-vozbudili-trete-ugolovnoe-delo/).

            Among those declared “heroes of civil society in Ingushetia” this year, the ninth such competition, its organizers say, are Uzhakhov, Boris Kodzoyev of the First Aid organization, blogger Artem Plato, the only woman Ingush activist in detention Zarifa Sautiyeva, and Nikolay Rybakov of Yabloko (kavkaz-uzel.eu/blogs/342/posts/41383).

            And in a reminder of another problem facing Ingushetia, the Kavkazr portal has published a story about the hundreds of Ingush who had to flee from Chechnya when the two Vaynakh peoples separated and still have not found permanent homes or much support from the authorities in Moscow and Magas (kavkazr.com/a/30387008.html).