Russian Appeals Court Refuses to Restore to Duty 13 Ingush Policemen Who Disobeyed Orders to Disperse March 2019 Protest

Paul Goble

           

            Staunton, July 17 – A Russian appeals court in Pyatigorsk rejected the appeal of 13 Ingush policemen who were dismissed from the force and then charged with various crimes after they refused to obey orders to use force against Ingush activists taking part in the March 2019 demonstrations against the border deal with Chechnya (doshdu.com/sud-otkazal-v-udovletvorenii-iska-policejskim-uvolennym-za-otkaz-razgonjat-miting-v-ingushetii/).

            The Stavropol Kray court confirmed the decision of the Ingush Supreme Court which had earlier refused to overrule a Magas district court, a problematic move procedurally in that the kray court is not superior to the Ingush Supreme Court.  That makes this decision distasteful in Ingushetia. The ex-policemen will now likely appeal to Moscow and then Strasbourg.

            One of the consequences of the development of many institutions of civil society in Ingushetia combined with a willingness of ever more Ingush to protest if their rights are trampled upon is that much of the political action in that republic now takes place in its courts or in courts in neighboring federal subject.

          Today, in addition to the Pyatigorsk court decision, there was movement in three other cases now wending their way through the courts:

• Yakub Belkhoroyev, the Ingush Popular Assembly deputy accused of diverting money from the social security fund, was moved from Vladikavkaz to Moscow (doshdu.com/jakuba-belhoroeva-jetapirovali-iz-vladikavkaza-v-moskvu/). The siloviki raided the office and home of one of his associates (kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/351996/). And investigators indicated the authorities are ready to add a charge of organizing a criminal conspiracy to misappropriation, something they would use to go after Belkhoroyev’s teip, the Batalkhadzhintsy (doshdu.com/protiv-deputata-iz-ingushetii-jakuba-belhoroeva-mogut-vozbudit-delo-ob-organizacii-prestupnogo-soobshhestva/).

• Yunus Bedzizhev, the owner of a hunting rifle store in Ingushetia now on the run from the police, put out another video in which he said that the siloviki had planted illegal arms on him and wanted to kill him so that they could take property belonging to his family (fortanga.org/2020/07/yunus-vedzizhev-obvinyaet-sotrudnikov-tspe-ingushetii-v-prestupleniyah/).

• Albert Khamkhoyev, who accused police of torture three years ago, issued a statement that since that time, not a single policeman has been charged (doshdu.com/spustja-tri-goda-v-dele-o-pytkah-zhitelja-ingushetii-net-ni-odnogo-podozrevaemogo-silovika/).

Meanwhile, the Plyiev teip issued an open appeal to the head of the republic’s popular assembly explaining why that body must overturn a law that Yunus-Bek Yevkurov pushed through so that he would not have to organize a referendum on the border change with Chechnya. That law, the teip said, continues to outrage Ingush society (fortanga.org/2020/07/tejp-plievyh-vozmutilsya-prinyatiem-zakona-ob-izbranii-glavy-ingushetii/).