Information about Salman Tepsurkaev gives hope to his wife

According to an interview released by the "Nasiliyu.net" centre, a wife of Salman Tepsurkaev receives reports stating that her husband is alive and hopes for his release due to the publicity of information about the kidnapping.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that in September, in Chechnya and beyond its borders, a wide public outcry was provoked by a video in which a naked Salman Tepsurkaev was sitting down on a bottle while explaining that he was doing that as punishment for his cooperation with the 1Adat Telegram Channel, which criticized the Chechen authorities. Human rights defenders succeeded in seeking a reaction from investigators to complaints about the kidnapping: a spouse of Salman Tepsurkaev had been questioned. Meanwhile, while responding to questions from the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), the Russian authorities stated that the law enforcement bodies had not been involved in the kidnapping of Salman Tepsurkaev. Employees of the "Committee against Torture" (CaT) and activists of the 1Adat Telegram Channel considered the Russian authorities' statement as unconvincing and noted that they had recognized the law enforcers involved in the kidnapping of Salman Tepsurkaev.

In her interview to the "Nasiliyu.net" centre, the wife of Salman Tepsurkaev has said that the wide public outcry provoked by the video with Salman Tepsurkaev and the information about the involvement of the Chechen law enforcers in his kidnapping gives hope that he is not only alive, but will also be released. "At present, there is a lot of criticism addressed to Ramzan Kadyrov. There is a small chance that such a public outcry will help somehow, and they will release him. Some people, and I will not name them, write me that Salman Tepsurkaev is alive, but he is still being held captive," said the wife of the kidnapped activist as quoted in the article "At first they are always being tortured" posted on the website of the "Nasiliyu.net" centre.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on October 16, 2020 at 06:03 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.