Press Release, 25.05.2014

Pyatigorsk, May 24, 2014. The YABLOKO party and representatives of the human rights community organised an interregional conference “Human Rights and Inter-Ethnic Relations in the Northern Caucasus”. YABLOKO leader Sergei Mitrokhin, member of the party Political Committee and a human rights activist Valery Borshchev, Valery Goryachev, Chief of YABLOKO Staff, and leaders and representatives of regional branches of the party participated in the event.

The meeting was also attended by Valery Khatazhukov, head of a public human rights center in Kabardino-Balkaria, Magomed Mutsulgov, Chairman of nonprofit organisation “Mashr”, Nikolay Lyashenko, Director of the Budenovsky branch of the Institute “Friendship of Peoples of the Caucasus “, human rights activist Kheda Saratov and many others.

One of the main topics discussed at the conference was persecution of human rights defenders and political activists by local authorities and law enforcement agencies.

“Corruption, kidnappings, mass violations of human rights during military operations – these are just some of the problems of the North Caucasus,” Sergei Mitrokhin said opening the conference.

Another problem, according to the YABLOKO leader, was negative attitude of the federal centre and the Russian political elite to the region.

“We have people who are happy at annexation of Crimea, and they say that the Caucasus should be separated [from the rest of Russia] by barbed wire. It is significant that there was no response to my appeals to the law enforcement and Vladimir Putin personally about criminal statements made by Vladimir Zhirinovsky and [Governor of the Krasnodar Territory] Alexander Tkachyov. So if one creates ten 10 ministries for the North Caucasus problems, at such an attitude you will not be able to solve a single problem,” Mitrokhin noted.

Valery Borschev expressed his confidence that the civil rights activists would be the driving force in the region. He also recalled that public activists’ joint actions could lead to tangible results, as had been the case with the release of Michail Savva, professor of the Kuban State University.

Magomed Shamilov, Chairman of the Independent Trade Union of Police Officers and Prosecutors told that the federal government were encouraging corruption and lawlessness in the law enforcement agencies, and officials were “making money on blood”.

“They have been continuously conducting military actions in the republic, when they should have conducted at least one brain storm,” Shamilov said with irony.

Anatoly Sidakov, leader of the North Ossetian branch of YABLOKO expressed his certainty that there were no interethnic problems between the peoples of the Caucasus and the Russian population, but there was organised crime in governing.

“The regional authorities would not have dared to behave in such a [blatant] way without federal support,” Sidakov said.

The conference adopted a decision to create a new Public Committee for Human Rights in the Northern Caucasus, which would solve the acute problems of residents and work with their appeals. The Committee should include representatives from the all the regions of the North Caucasus, one representative per each region. A work plan would be developed by the end of the year.

Also basing on the results of the conference YABLOKO forwarded letter to Vladimir Putin asking him to take under personal control the trial over Chechen human rights activist Ruslan Kutayev which had been going on for four months already.

Human rights defenders connected the prosecution with Kutayev’s criticism of the actions of head of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov who had banned mourning ceremonies on the verge of the date of deportation of Chechens by Joseph Stalin. Kutayev voiced his criticism on that on February 18 at the academic conference “Deportation of the Chechen People. What It Was and Can It Be Forgotten?” According to human rights activists, Kutayev was tortured after his arrest.

A video with all the speeches will be uploaded on our web-site soon.

On May 26 Sergei Mitrokhin will meet with local residents and activists of the regional branches of YABLOKO in Nalchik and Grozny. The meetings will be attended by Khakim Kuchmezov, leader of Kabardino-Balkarian branch of YABLOKO, Anatoly Sidakov, Chair of the party branch in the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania and Valery Goryachev, Chief of YABLOKO Staff.