Pro-war Russian blogger accuses Chechen ‘Akhmat’ fighters of torture

Yegor Guzenko, a participant in the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and a pro-war blogger with a Telegram channel of 300,000 subscribers, has accused fighters from the Chechen ‘Akhmat’ special forces unit of torturing him after his arrest in Stavropol Krai in October.

On 17 December, Guzenko recorded and published a series of videos and voice messages on his Telegram channel with a detailed description of what happened while in pre-trial detention.

‘I experienced all the “delights” of torture and isolation centres’, Guzenko said in one of the videos shared on Telegram.

According to Guzenko, the Kadyrovtsy (a term used to describe Chechen fighters working under Chechen head Ramzan Kadyrov) used the prison administration to organise the torture.

He added that while he is currently ‘in one of the best assault units in the Russian army’, he and his mother continue to receive threats, and that he is now being harassed by other pro-war bloggers at the behest of the Akhmat unit.

In his posts on Telegram, Guzenko rudely asked the harassers to leave him alone and also reminded the Kadyrovtsy of his grievances. He added that if the threats did not stop, he would continue to publicise the conflict between the special forces unit and himself.

A history of conflict

Guzenko was originally arrested in his hometown of Novopavlovsk, Stavropol Krai in early October. After the blogger’s arrest, the Governor of Stavropol Krai, Vladimir Vladimirov, said that Guzenko had appeared at a city festival wearing a balaclava and had put up a ‘fierce resistance’ during his arrest.

At the time of his arrest, Guzenko was also wanted as part of a prior criminal case opened in St. Petersburg on charges of ‘hooliganism with the use of weapons’. While awaiting the verdict in March 2022, Guzenko left his place of residence to take part in the Russian invasion of Ukraine, after which he was put on both federal and international wanted lists.

Kremlin propagandist Anastasia Kashevarova, a former adviser to the chairman of the State Duma Vyacheslav Volodin, later reported that Guzenko had never served in any combat unit, and that Russian soldiers know him by the call sign ‘tourist’, because he ‘comes to take pictures’ and then ‘leaves’ in a couple of days.

Prior to his arrest in Stavropol Krai, Guzenko had regularly criticized the Akhmat special forces unit, including its commander, Apti Alaudinov. Their last public dispute took place just a week before Guzenko's arrest, and stemmed from Alaudinov’s call for captured Chechen fighters to ‘do everything to be killed’.

In response to Alaudinov’s statement, Guzenko alleged that Kadyrovtsy were more focused on creating social media content than fighting,  and also asked rhetorically why the generals were ‘not shot’ for their mistakes.

Alaudinov did not respond to Guzenko’s statements, but fighters from the Aida group, a subsidiary of Akhmat, responded publicly.

According to them, Alaudinov ‘should not be insulted or criticised’, and if Guzenko did not stop such comments, they would ‘have to help’ him, implying they would try to hurt or kill him.

In mid-November, the court released Guzenko from custody on the condition he go fight in Ukraine.

There have been numerous cases of Akhmat fighters using violence against civilians and others.

In September 2024, a 37-year-old local resident was hospitalised in the Belgorod region with a skull fracture after being detained by Akhmat fighters for filming a bridge over the Oskol River. In October 2023, a Belgorod volunteer, Alexander Demidenko, was arrested while allegedly helping Ukrainians cross the border. Following his detention, Demidenko was reportedly abducted by Kadyrovtsy and subsequently found dead in a pre-trial detention centre. According to the Federal Penitentiary Service, the official cause of death was suicide.