Russia

Chechen President Denies Torture Accusations

(RFE/RL) March 14, 2007 -- Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov has rejected charges by the Europe's top rights watchdog of continuing abuses in Chechnya.

On March 13, the antitorture committee of the Council of Europe issued a statement saying that detainees in Chechnya were being ill-treated and tortured by members of Russian law enforcement agencies.

REPORT: Pro-Moscow Chechen security forces caught on video abusing civilians.

It was the third time the Council of Europe has criticized Russia over the issue.


But Kadyrov told Interfax that human rights abuses in Chechnya were a thing of the past.


Kadyrov said Chechnya had made "significant progress respecting human rights in prisons" and that the government was striving to make residents of the republic "feel protected by the law."


Likewise, Chechen Deputy Prime Minister Ziyad Sabsabi said those who think torture continues in the republic "are living somewhere in the past."


(Interfax, AFP)

The Chechnya Conflict

The Chechnya Conflict

The aftermath of a December 2002 Chechen resistance attack on the main government building in Grozny (epa)

CHRONOLOGY

The fighting in Chechnya has raged, with short breaks, since 1994. It has brought misery, death, and destruction to the North Caucasus republic and to Russia as a whole. View an annotated timeline of the conflict.



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