Russian authorities designate Chechen activist and former Ichkherian official as foreign agent

The Russian Ministry of Justice has added Chechen political activist, human rights advocate, and former Ichkherian official Ruslan Kutaev to its registry of foreign agents.

According to the ministry’s official statement, Kutaev, who resides outside of Russia, was included for ‘spreading false information about decisions of the Russian authorities’, regularly criticising Moscow over the war in Ukraine, and allegedly receiving foreign funding.

The ministry further claimed that Kutaev participated in the creation and dissemination of messages and materials for an unlimited audience on behalf of ‘foreign agents’ and that he leads an organisation deemed ‘undesirable’ in Russia — a reference to the Assembly of the Peoples of the Caucasus, which Kutaev currently heads.

Ruslan Kutaev, 66, was born in Chechnya. Before the first Chechen war, he was general director of the Kavkaz oil company and served as deputy prime minister under the governments of Ichkeria of Dzhokhar Dudaev and later Aslan Maskhadov.

Ichkheria was a short-lived separatist Chechen state that was formed after the collapse of the Soviet Union and was subsequently crushed by Russia following two wars.

In March 2014, he was detained shortly after organising a conference marking the 70th anniversary of the deportation of the Chechen people without receiving prior approval from local authorities. He was subsequently sentenced to four years in prison on drug possession charges — a case widely condemned by rights groups as politically motivated. In 2023, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Kutaev’s prosecution had violated his rights.

Following his release in December 2017, Kutaev left Russia and has since been living abroad, continuing to comment publicly on developments in Chechnya and the North Caucasus.

Russia’s foreign agent law has been in effect since 2012. Initially targeting NGOs that received international funding, the legislation has been gradually expanded. In 2017, it was extended to media outlets, and by 2020 it encompassed individuals engaged in loosely defined ‘political activity’. Under the law, foreign agents must label all their content — including social media posts — with a disclaimer, report regularly to the Justice Ministry, and are subject to mandatory financial audits.

The law was used to crush dissent in Russia, paralysing civil society and media in the country.

Kutaev is not the first activist from the North Caucasus to be designated as a foreign agent. Among those listed as foreign agents are Daghestani journalist Murad Muradov, Circassian activists Ibragim Yaganov and Martin Kochesoko, Nogay activist Anvar Kurmanakaev, historian and RFE/RL contributor Mayrbek Vachagaev, Daghestani journalist and activist Idris Yusupov, the editor-in-chief of Caucasian Knot, Grigory Shvedov, and others.

Human rights organisations such as the North Caucasus SOS Crisis Group, the Committee for Ingush Independence, RFE/RL’s North Caucasus service  have also been labelled foreign agents.

Russia designates two Chechen opposition bloggers as foreign agents

Opposition Chechen bloggers Islam Belokiev and Hasan Uzarov are the latest to be added to Russia’s foreign agents registry.

OC MediaElizaveta Chukharova