The Chechen opposition movement NIYSO has reported the abduction of two young residents of Chechnya — Adam Bekbulatov from the village of Alkhan-Kala and Magomed Chataev from Grozny. According to activists, they were abducted several days ago by security forces, taken to a police department and subjected to torture in an attempt to force them to sign a contract to be sent to the full-scale war in Ukraine. There is no confirmation of this information from other sources.
According to NIYSO, no official charges have been brought against Bekbulatov and Chataev. Activists claim that both men were detained without any procedural documents being issued. The movement also said that the two were beaten before being taken to the police department.
In its statement, the movement said that the abduction ‘differed from the usual pattern’. Typically, NIYSO said that in such cases abductees were not beaten by a group.
Representatives of NIYSO claim that the order to ‘punish’ the young men was allegedly given by Chechnya’s Deputy Interior Minister Deni Aydamirov.
Activists link the incident to a conflict that, according to them, took place in November last year in Alkhan-Kala. At that time, NIYSO said that Bekbulatov and Chataev had fought with police officers and then gone into hiding. The movement reported that the settlement was surrounded by security forces and that an interception plan had been announced across the republic in order to find the men.
According to activists, the conflict began when officers from one of the district police departments arrived in Alkhan-Kala to abduct a local resident. According to sources cited by the movement, a friend tried to intervene during the abduction, but the man was nevertheless taken away.
NIYSO claimed that the officers returned some time later to detain the second young man who had interfered. At that moment, according to activists, a third acquaintance intervened in the situation. The movement said he chased the officers’ car through the centre of Alkhan-Kala, blocked their path and got into a fight with them.
‘When the third of the friends learned that his friend had been taken away by two plainclothes officers, he immediately got behind the wheel and drove after them. He managed to catch up with the car. He overtook them, sharply turned the wheel and blocked the road. Getting out of the car, he addressed one of the officers with the words: “Do you remember abducting my relative and extorting money from him? Did you think that would be forgotten?”’.
‘The two operatives got out of the car; one of them was tall, almost two metres. The young man, out of habit, suggested they fight one on one. But instead of answering, the officer did what such cowards in uniform, accustomed to impunity, do — he suddenly reached for his pistol. At that moment the car door swung open and his abducted friend, gathering his strength, jumped out and struck the officer, knocking the weapon from his hand.
A scuffle and a fight began. In the end both friends managed to break free and drive away, leaving the two men lying on the asphalt’, NIYSO activists wrote.
The movement also claims that after the incident security forces detained several relatives of the young men. Activists say they were held in order to force the wanted men to surrender.
According to NIYSO, Bekbulatov and Chataev were athletes who ‘had connections reaching the Kadyrov family’. The movement claims that about a month after the conflict they managed to obtain an ‘informal amnesty’, after which they returned and continued living in Chechnya. Activists say that their safety was allegedly guaranteed by the son of the Chechen Head and secretary of the republic’s Security Council, 18-year-old Adam Kadyrov.
