Borozdinovskaya refugees hold protest meeting in Dagestan

The residents of the Chechen village of Borozdinovskaya, who left their homes in June 2005, are holding a 300-strong protest action in the Kizlyar District of Dagestan.

The residents of the village are categorically against returning home and demand to inform them about the fate of their eleven missing fellow countrymen, allot land plots and pay out compensation for their lost housing facilities and property, the "Interfax" reports.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported earlier that on June 4, 2005, in Borozdinovskaya village of the Shelkovskoj District, employees of power agencies rushed into houses of local residents, brought all the men living in village in cars to the local school and beat them ruthlessly there. Then, the power agents who were carrying out the operation called out 11 persons by their names and took them away to unknown place. Since then, their whereabouts and further destiny remain unknown.

Now, two years after the clean-up ("zachistka") in Borozdinovskaya village of Chechnya, the identified organizers of the tragedy remain unpunished, while the truth is concealed from the victims - their requests and petitions remain unanswered. This is the topic of an official statement of the Committee Against Tortures.

It follows from the daily report of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) of Chechnya dated June 5, 2005, that the "Vostok" (East) battalion of the Ministry of Defence (MoD) detained, in the course of a special operation carried out in Borozdinovskaya village, local residents (those disappeared 11 persons) on suspicion of committing crime, and that they had not been entered into the database of searched persons. This document, which was found by human rights activists, was immediately delivered to the bodies of the Military Office of Public Prosecutor with a corresponding petition to add it to the materials of the case.

"Should any high-ranking officials be interested in concealing this information from the official investigation, or should the bodies that are holding the official investigation have no intention, for whatever reason, to check the justified version about involvement of state agencies in kidnapping and murder of peaceful citizens, the party responsible for this crime and for inefficient investigation before the European Court for Human Rights will be the Russian Federation," the Committee's statement runs.