Lawyer Says First Ingush Sentences Indicative of Those to Be Handed Down in the Future

Paul Goble

            Staunton, December 14 – Lawyer Andrey Sabinin says the first two sentences handed down against Ingush demonstrators are likely to be the model for future ones, thus possibly less than prosecutors seek and perhaps reduced to time served, but that does not make them any less unreasonable because the charges are completely baseless (kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/343532/).

            Meanwhile, single picketers in the two Russian capitals demonstrated in support of the Ingush detainees. Moscow activist Nadezhda Sorokina said that the Ingush are doing exactly what Muscovites are: “Perhaps, they make a greater accent on ethnic rights. But each has his own problem: somewhere, this is ecology, elsewhere social rights or human rights.”

            “All of these issues deserve attention and defense,” she added (kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/343537/).

            And St. Petersburg activist Marina Ken appeared with a poster in support of the Ingush activists. She has attracted attention for her earlier demonstrations on behalf of those arrested for their roles in the March 2019 protests (kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/343529/).

            Meanwhile, there were three other important Ingushetia-related developments. First and at the request of Grozny,  Russian Prime Minister formally renamed the area that Chechnya acquired from Ingushetia as a result of the September 26, 2018 deal between Yunus-Bek Yevkurov and Ramzan Kadyrov that sparked the protests.

            The area, formerly the Sunzhe district of Ingushetia will now be called the Sernov district of Chechnya, yet another way in which Moscow has demonstrated its tilt toward Grozny and another basis for anger against the Russian capital among the Ingush (fortanga.org/2019/12/medvedev-pereimenoval-byvshij-sunzhenskij-rajon-ingushetii-v-sernovodskij/).

            Second, Ingush head Makmud-Ali Kalimatov dismissed labor minister Zelimkhan Kotikov, the tenth senior official the new republic head has fired since taking office (capost.media/news/policy/v-ingushetii-osvobozhden-ot-dolzhnosti-ministr-kotikov/ and  kcent.site/eksklyuziv/6706).

            And third, pupils in Ingushetia have been prohibited from bringing cellphones to class. Moscow has imposed this restriction in a restricted fashion thereby making it appear that the center has imposed this ban where it is most concerned that pupils might be attracted to protests (capost.media/news/obrazovanie/v-severnoy-osetii-i-ingushetii-zapretili-mobilniki-v-shkolakh/  and znak.com/2019-12-14/v_rossii_chetvert_shkol_zapretila_ispolzovat_mobilnye_telefony_na_urokah).