Russian Journalist Charged For Coverage Of Accident and Students Forced To Clean Up Damaged Power Station

Mikhail Afanasyev, a journalist in the Russian republic of Khakassia is being charged with libel after his reports on the accident at the Sayano-Shushenskaya hydropower station were deemed “inaccurate” by local officials as he  has been covering the story at the power station where at least 60 people are still missing and 17 have been confirmed dead after one of the turbine rooms flooded early on August 17.

The local Prosecutor’s Office said that Afanasyev — who wrote that there may still be survivors in the lower levels of the dam — is accused of giving “wrong information that damaged the honor and business reputation of the republic’s leadership and the administration of the power station.”

The republic’s prosecutor-general says some officials at the Siberian Federal University branch in the town of Cheremushki, where the power station is located, forced 105 students to do cleanup work after the deadly accident at the station on August 17.

More than 70 people died when a part of the dam at the station broke down and was flooded in August. The accident led to the university moving the start of its academic year from September 1 to October 1.

St. Petersboug Ombudsman dissmised – WHY?

Igor Mikhailov, a United Russia politician who became St. Petersburg’s first ombudsman in 2007, was removed from his position by the city council last week for alleged political activity, which is forbidden for ombudsmen under Russian law.

Nine employees from Mikhailov’s office ran in regional elections in Leningrad Oblast earlier this month. Mikhailov told RFE/RL that a possible reason for his dismissal might be some of the reforms he proposed. He said that he might be paying for his efforts to reach an agreement between the opposition and the government on standards for holding protests. Mikhailov added that he also promoted gay and transgender rights.

Russian Federation ombudsman Vladimir Lukin said that according to international standards the ombudsman post is not accountable to the government, should not be subject to dismissal by it, and should not be persecuted for its decisions.

Human rights activists in St. Petersburg welcomed Mikhailov’s dismissal as they have been critical of his failure to support the rights of citizens.

In Moscow Russian Police Detain 70 At Human Rights Protest

On October 31 at an unsanctioned human rights protest in central Moscow chant “Freedom!” and “Respect the constitution!”
“I want Russia to be free, not to rot in a policeman’s nightmare,” said one of them.
Moscow police spokesman Viktor Biryukov said about 50 people had been detained at the protest which he said was attended by about 100 people and 100 reporters.Opposition activists said about 70 people had been detained and that 500 people had showed up.

Hundreds of police and Interior Ministry troops encircled the “march of the discontented” on Triumfalnaya Square, just a few kilometers north of the Kremlin. Unlike previous protests, riot police were not used to make arrests.

Human rights groups say the Kremlin has muzzled the media and rolled back freedoms since Vladimir Putin was first elected president in 2000 and the situation has not improved under his protege, President Dmitry Medvedev.

Azerbaijan’s oil ‘keeps critics quiet’

Azerbaijan is less at risk from attack than the countries commonly associated with terrorism, suicide bombings and the rest but it is in a difficult situation.To the north lie the mountains of Dagestan, a place where recent bloodshed is linked to an Islamist insurgency.

In Azerbaijan itself, there have been at least two major foiled terror plots against embassies and oil installations – both of which the government has blamed on foreign insurgents.

And perhaps it is oil – or the wealth accrued from it – which Azerbaijan wants to protect more than anything else.

Azerbaijan’s rank as the world’s fastest growing economy in recent years has allowed it to pay for the cleaning of every single facade of its turn-of the-century buildings, previously blackened by pollution.The beautiful old city and its fairy-tale walls have been restored to perfection. And it is perhaps oil that has kept its elite rich, silencing many of the government’s potential critics. Those who remain outspoken have at times been warned.

Critical journalists have in the past been arrested.The notion of authority has come to take on a whole new meaning in Azerbaijan. As a secular state, it is not religious leaders whose pictures you see everywhere, but that of Heydar Aliyev, the former president and late father of the current president.

Доклад Специального докладчика OOH по вопросу борьбы с терроризмом Мартина Шейнина

Шестьдесят четвертая сессия OOH  0 29.10.2009 New York

Генеральный секретарь имеет честь препроводить членам Генеральной Ассамблеи доклад Специального докладчика по вопросу о поощрении и защите прав человека и основных свобод в условиях борьбы с терроризмом Мартина Шейнина, представленный в соответствии с резолюцией 62/159 Генеральной Ассамблеи и резолюцией 6/28 Совета по правам человека.

.…… 30. Меры по борьбе с терроризмом имеют недопустимые побочные гендерные последствия, которые зачастую не учитываются и никак не компенсируются. Так, насильственные исчезновения задержанных мужчин,оправдываемые борьбой с терроризмом, имеют «особое звучание» для членов их семей-женщин, на которых ложится основное бремя тревог, притеснений, социального отчуждения и экономических невзгод в связи с потерей кормильца-мужчины. …..

31. Специальный докладчик также обеспокоен тем, что женщины (и дети),отнюдь не подозреваемые в совершении связанных с терроризмом преступлений, подвергаются незаконному содержанию под стражей и жестокому обращению, чтобы получить от них информацию об их родственниках-мужчинах52-или заставить мужчин, подозреваемых в терроризме, предоставить информацию или дать признательные показания53. Такие коллективные санкции не только являются дискриминационными, но и непосредственно влияют на другие права, закрепленные Международным пактом о гражданских и политических правах…..

“Nothing can be valued above human life” – Medvedev

October the 30th is the Day of remembrance for millions of ruined lives. For people executed without trial or record; for people exiled and sent to concentration camps, deprived of civil rights for having the “wrong” occupation or the infamous “social origins”. The label of “enemies of the nation” and their “abettors” was applied to entire families. ..the sheer scale of terror that swept across the country, peaking in 1937 and 1938. “The Volga of people’s grief” was Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s term for the endless flow of repression victims at that time. Over the 20 pre-war years, whole sectors and classes of our nation were exterminated. Cossacks were practically liquidated. The peasantry was dispossessed and depleted. Political repressions swept across intelligentsia, workers, and the military. Followers of all religious confessions were prosecuted. Medvedev said:

Let’s just think about it: millions of people died because of terror and false accusation. They were deprived of all rights, even the right for humane burial.

Yet even now we can hear voices saying that those numerous deaths were justified by some supreme goals of the state. I am convinced that no development of a country, no success or ambitions can be achieved through human grief and losses.

Nothing can be valued above human life, and there is no excuse for repressions.

Доклад ООН: Россия не в состоянии защитить своих граждан

Комитет ООН по правам человека публикует доклад, в котором утверждается, что Россия не в состоянии обеспечить защиту журналистов, активистов различных движений, заключенных и других граждан, находящихся в конфликте с властями.

Противостояние подобного рода грозит оппозиционерам нарушением их прав, пытками и даже убийством, утверждают авторы доклада.Документ подготовлен экспертным советом, состоящим из 18 человек. Они обратились к Кремлю с призывом внести ряд изменений в российское законодательство – в частности, сузить юридические определение понятий “терроризм” и “экстремизм”, отменить уголовную ответственность за диффамацию и дать право на апелляцию людям, отправленным в психиатрические лечебницы по решению суда.

Кроме того, доклад возлагает ответственность на российские власти за нападения военнослужащих на мирных жителей в Южной Осетии после августовской войны с Грузией и призывает Москву тщательно расследовать эти случаи.

В документе также говорится, что над журналистами в России чинятся политические суды, в ходе которых выносятся политически мотивированные приговоры. Это приводит к значительному сокращению критики властей в прессе.

Самой жесткой критике подверглась судебная система в Чечне и в других регионах Северного Кавказа. Авторы упоминают многочисленные сообщения о происходящих там пытках, исчезновениях людей, необоснованных арестах и убийствах, совершенных военными и представителями спецслужб.

Но главное, говорится в документе, люди, совершающие все эти преступления, пользуются абсолютной безнаказанностью.

States Should Admit Asylum-seekers Who Were Forced To Aid Terrorists

The UN Special Rapporteur’s  report to a General Assembly Committee which deals with social, humanitarian and cultural affairs, devotes considerable attention to the gender dimension and specific rights of women in the war against terrorism.

“Victims of gender-based persecution, including by terrorist groups, should be granted asylum and entry into countries and never fall victims of the notions of material support to terrorism.”

The report available here …

30. Counter-terrorism measures have had impermissible gendered collateral effects that are often neither acknowledged nor compensated. Indeed, enforced disappearances of male detainees in the name of countering terrorism have had “special resonance” for female family members, who bear the burden of anxiety, harassment, social exclusion and economic hardship occasioned by the loss of the male breadwinner. ..
31. The Special Rapporteur is also concerned that women (and children) not suspected of terrorism-related offences are unlawfully detained and ill-treated to either gain information about male family members or to compel male terrorism suspects to provide information or confessions. As well as being discriminatory, such collective sanctions resolve the disappearances of members of their family, making them susceptible to intimidation, persecution and reprisals.” ….

Russia’s political murders – Putin and Medvedev nothing to say about killings

The Washington Post: MURDERS OF human rights activists in Russia have been happening with such frequency that some will be tempted to shrug at the brutal slaying on Sunday of Maksharip Aushev, who campaigned against abuses by the security forces in the Caucasian republic of Ingushetia. .. His funeral came two months after that of Zarema Sadulayeva, the head of a children’s charity in neighboring Chechnya, and her husband, who were shot and stuffed in a car trunk. Those murders, in turn, followed the July 15 killing of Natalya Estemirova, Chechnya’s most prominent human rights activist. No one has been charged for the murder last Jan. 19 of human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov and journalist Anastasia Baburova, who were gunned down on a busy street just blocks from the Kremlin. The murderers of journalist Anna Politkovskaya.

These courageous men and women had in common their effort to hold Russian security forces accountable for the extrajudicial killings, torture and rape of innocent civilians in Chechnya, Ingushetia and other Caucasus republics.

Russia leader Vladimir Putin has been shrugging at this gangsterism all along. He disparaged Ms. Politkovskaya, one of the country’s most renowned journalists, shortly after her death, and he’s had nothing to say about the recent killings. President Dmitry Medvedev has been a little more responsive…

Belarus: Victims Of Unlawful And Cruel Treatment Of Riot Militia In Minsk Inform the UN Special Repporteur On Torture

Three peaceful demonstrations – on September 9 and 16 and October 16 – have been brutally dispersed in Belarus during the last month. Demonstrators were beaten and arrested unlawfully. Riot militia also hindered the work of journalists, not allowing them to film the outrage.

Complaint letters of the victims of unlawful and cruel treatment of riot militia and testimonies of witnesses of torturing are attached to the appeal which was sent to Manfred Nowak, the UN Special Repporteur on Torture. Human rights activists hope these facts will be given due attention of international organizations and prosecution bodies of Belarus.

Human rights say for the last few years, the prosecution agencies of Belarus have not given legal evaluation and refused to instigated criminal cases against the militiamen, who mistreated the detained participants of political demonstrations.

Victims of terror act at Dubrovka to go to European Court

On October 27, the Moscow City Court refused to increase the sum of payments to the victims of plundering of hostages’ belongings at the Dubrovka terror act and to compensate their moral damage; thus, having rejected the cassation complaint against the decision of the Zamoskvoretski Court, who had ruled to pay 130 thousand roubles under two claims.

“The cassation panel of the Moscow City Court has rejected the complaint in full,” said Igor Trunov, a victims’ advocate.  “We’re going to appeal against this decision. Most likely, we’ll address the European Court of Human Rights.”

7 years expired after the Dubrovka terror act in Moscow and nobody has until now answered a number of important questions; the main ones are: why was it impossible to do without storming the building, which entailed so many victims killed by unknown gas and why special troops killed all the terrorists, although many of them were unconscious?

So Far No Evidence CIA Planes Landed In Lithuania

New York Times: A recent report by ABC News claimed the CIA had a secret prison in Vilnius from September 2004 through November 2005.The report provided flight details of the airplanes that allegedly delivered prisoners to Vilnius Airport.

However a Lithuanian lawmaker says there is no evidence that .

National Security and Defense Committee chairman Arvydas Anusauskas said Tuesday that records provided by the Civil Aviation Administration show that no U.S. airplanes with al-Qaida suspects ever landed or crossed Lithuania airspace on the dates and times specified in U.S. media.

Lithuania’s investigation into the possibility that the CIA set up secret prisons will continue.

Рамзан Кадыров отчитает “Новую газету”

Господин Красненков рассказал  что готовит от имени Рамзана Кадырова иск в Басманный суд о защите чести и достоинства к “Новой газете”. Предметом иска станут, по его словам, минимум восемь публикаций, которые порочат честь чеченского президента. В первую очередь речь идет о статье “Расстрел в Вене”. Речь в этом материале шла об убийстве в столице Австрии бывшего охранника господина Кадырова Умара Исраилова, который ранее заявлял, что может доказать причастность Рамзана Кадырова к ряду убийств в Чечне.

Суду предстоит также рассмотреть несколько публикаций “Новой газеты” о расследовании убийства адвоката Станислава Маркелова и журналистки “Новой” Анастасии Бабуровой.

Oppositionist Maksharip Aushev Was Irritator For Ingush Authorities. He Criticized – He Had To Be Killed.

On October 25 in the Federal Motorway Maksharip Aushev (a well-known Ingush oppositionist and former owner of the website “Ingushetia.Org) was shelled by unidentified persons from a passing-by car and  died. His cousin of 29, who was in the car with him, was brought to a hospital of the Chegem District with heavy wounds received as a result of shelling.

Aushev’s colleagues are sure that he was executed for his human rights activities, and that power agents were involved in the crime. Aushev soon was to speak to the Council of Europe on the situation in Ingushetia. After execution of Aushev’s nephew earlier this April, Maksharip Aushev has repeatedly accused the republic’s leadership of inability to stop extrajudicial executions.

“Aushev was at ‘aiming sight’ for a long time. There were numerous attempts to arrest him; his house was searched many times. First, he was kept at the SIZO (pre-trial prison). Ms Malsagova said to the “Caucasian Knot” correspondent and marked that power agents may stand behind the oppositionist’s murder.

“Maksharip’s relations with President were far from being cloudless. He often sent to me his texts-appeals, which were in fact ultimatums to Evkurov – to stop extrajudicial executions in the republic. Every time I tried to dissuade him from categorical statements, warning him about the real danger hanging over him.”

“The following is absolutely clear now: being engaged in human rights activities, or being with the opposition, or being a journalist is a mortal danger in Northern Caucasus,” said Tatiana Lokshina, deputy head of the Moscow bureau of the HRW.

Maksharip Aushev: my escape from kidnapping was a miracle ( had happened on 15 September)

16 Georgians arrested by Russian forces were cutting wood

The EU Monitoring Mission [EUMM] in Georgia made the special statement over the yesterday’s detention of 16 Georgians in Gremiskhevi settlement of Dusheti region.

“EUMM expresses concern about the recent incident in which 16 Georgian citizens from the village of Gremiskhevi were arrested by Russian Border Guards whilst cutting firewood.

The arrest of the 16 residents of Gremiskhevi seriously affects the daily life of this village. At the same time, the incident reflects the wider problem of activities along the ABL which are likely to increase due preparations for the winter season. EUMM believes the IPRM is the appropriate forum to discuss the matter in order to reach a sustainable solution,” the statement says.