Ingush Teip Leader and Rights Activists from Moscow Come to Essentuki to Support Ingush Seven

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 18 – As the trial of the Ingush Seven appears to be reaching its end, a leader of the Council of Teips of Ingushetia and a group of Moscow human rights activists came to Essentuki where the trial is being held to express their support for the accused and to demand that the court follow the law

            They then released a video expressing their common conviction that the charges were inappropriate, that the defendants had in fact kept the situation far calmer in 2019 than would otherwise have been the case, and that the court should find them not guilty and release them   (fortanga.org/2021/05/pravozashhitniki-prizvali-sud-k-spravedlivomu-resheniyu-po-delu-ingushskih-aktivistov/).

            Lawyers for the accused welcomed this expression of support but said that despite it and despite the failure of prosecutors or witnesses to provide evidence in support of the government’s concention, the defense is sure that the court’s decision has already been made on orders from elsewhere and that the Ingush Seven will be found guilty (kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/364052/).

            Most of the defendants have been in preliminary detention for two years. Their health has been compromised, and jailors have violated Russian law not only by moving them from one detention center to another without notification but by limiting the ability of friends and relatives to visit them.

            The case itself has been before a judge since November 24, but hearings have been irregular. When they have occurred, defense lawyers say, prosecutors have read into the record information gathered earlier because when they have offered witnesses, the latter have failed to provide evidence of the defendants’ guilt.