Chechnya

Novaya Gazeta is one of the last bastions of press freedom in Russia and its editor Dmitry Muratov was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021.

A Russian investigative journalist working for the independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta has been hospitalized after being badly beaten in Chechnya, the newspaper and the Russian human rights NGO Morial reported.

And Elena Milashina, an expert on Chechnya, was attacked after she went to this Russian republic located in the Caucasus to cover the verdict hearing in one of the cases, according to “Memorial”.

The human rights organization added, in a statement, that “Elena Milashina’s fingers were fractured and she loses consciousness from time to time,” noting that “she has many bruises throughout her body.”

In pictures published by the Novaya Gazeta newspaper on Telegram, Milashina appeared on a hospital bed with bandages on her arms, while the assailants sprayed her face with a green substance, and it appeared to be swollen.

Memorial explained that the car in which the journalist was accompanied by lawyer Alexander Nemov was attacked by “armed men” on the road between the airport and the Chechen capital, Grozny.

The organization added that the journalist and the lawyer were “severely beaten and kicked, even in the face, and threatened with death, with a gun pointed at their heads.”

Reporters Without Borders condemned this “brutal attack”.

The Russian delegate for human rights, Tatyana Moskalkova, called Milashina before announcing the transfer of the journalist to another hospital in Bisan, in the Republic of North Ossetia, neighboring Chechnya in the Caucasus.

And she stressed, in a statement reported by the “Interfax” news agency, that the journalist’s safety and security “will be fully guaranteed,” calling for a “careful investigation” into this attack.

The journalist angered the Chechen authorities by documenting, especially, extrajudicial executions carried out there.

In February 2022, she was forced to leave Russia for a while, according to her newspaper, after Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov threatened her, describing her as a “terrorist.”

On Tuesday, journalist and lawyer Alexander Nemov went to Grozny to attend the reading of the verdict against Zarema Musayeva, the wife of former Russian federal judge Saidi Yagulbayev, who became an opponent of Kadyrov.

The Chechen security services arrested Musaeva (53 years old) in January 2022 in northern Russia and took her by force to the Caucasus.

The judge’s wife was accused of “fraud” and “using force” against a policeman. On Tuesday, a court in Grozny sentenced her to five and a half years in prison.

Novaya Gazeta is one of the last bastions of press freedom in Russia, and its editor-in-chief, Dmitry Muratov, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021.

Because of its commitment to covering human rights violations in Chechnya in particular, the newspaper incurred human losses with the assassination of a number of its employees, the most famous of which was journalist Anna Politkovskaya.

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2023-07-04 16:01:36