Rights defenders doubt link of North-Ossetian woman's disappearance with occultism

In Chechnya, persecution of people involved in occultism usually resorts to public scolding, while in Ingushetia and North Ossetia there have been no persecutions of fortune-tellers in recent years, lawyers and human rights defenders have pointed out in their comments on the version voiced out by a relative of Rimma Gagloeva, a missing resident of North Ossetia, who was engaged in fortune telling and removing an evil eye.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that Gagloeva's nephew asked Ramzan Kadyrov to help in searching for her aunt and a taxi driver from Ingushetia, who was taking her on February 6 from the Grozny Airport.

Zaur Begiev, an advocate, said that he had not encountered any harassment of fortune-tellers in North Ossetia.

"In 2005-2007, people went missing in North Ossetia; and their whereabouts have not been established yet," Timur Akiev, a human rights defender, has noted. According to his story, there were speculations that this was due to the actions of the so-called "avengers" for the militants' attack on the Beslan school.

People involved in occultism were attacked in Ingushetia, but that was in 2006-2009, when the armed underground was active in the republic, Mr Akiev has added.

In recent years, there have been many disappearances of Ingushes, said Ruslan Mutsolgov, a member of the "Mashr" human rights organization. "The last highlight was in 2017, when entrepreneur, Magomed Mamatov, was kidnapped in North Ossetia and found dead five months later," Mr Mutsolgov has added.