Police have detained a 19-year-old Chechen woman at Moscow's Vnukovo Airport while she was on her way out of Russia to escape domestic violence, rights defenders told RFE/RL on June 12.
According to Sofia Rusova of the Center for Defense from Domestic Violence, Selima Ismailova lived with her family in Germany for several years but later was sent to her relatives in Chechnya, where she was regularly abused.
The founder of the Marem human rights project, Svetlana Anokhina, told RFE/RL that in 2021, Ismailova's father visited her in the Chechen city of Achkhoi-Martan and severely beat her.
Anokhina added that Marem helped Ismailova flee Chechnya for Moscow and provided her with a shelter in the Russian capital, where the woman stayed for some time before she planned to fly from Russia to an unspecified country.
Rusova told RFE/RL that police at Vnukovo Airport refused to hand Ismailova to her lawyers, saying that they are waiting for law enforcement officers from Chechnya to collect Ismailova, who is allegedly wanted in Chechnya for a theft.
Human right defenders have said for some time that relatives in the North Caucasus often file complaints accusing fugitive women of crimes, usually thefts, to legalize their detainment and return to their relatives.
Domestic violence has been a problem in Russia's North Caucasus region for decades. Victims who manage to flee often say that they may face "punishment," including honor killings, if they are forced to return.
Local authorities usually take the side of the accused abusers.
Last October, four sisters from another North Caucasus region, Daghestan, managed to flee to Georgia with the help of human rights organizations after they faced domestic violence.
In August 2022, another woman from Daghestan, Patimat Idrisova, managed to leave Russia and change her identity after she faced domestic violence.
In 2021, two victims of domestic violence in Daghestan were forcibly taken from a shelter in Tatarstan and brought back to their homes against their will.
Also in 2021, a police officer rushed into a shelter in the capital of Daghestan, Makhachkala, and forcibly took away a Chechen woman, Khalimat Taramova, who had fled Chechnya with the intention of living with her girlfriend.