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If a person is abducted, Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, who has become president of Ingushetia following the resignation of Murat Ziazikov, travels promptly to the scene of the crime and demands that the militia initiate an urgent search, Liudmila Alekseyeva explained. In September, during a previous trip to Ingushetia, she visited the “Mashr” organisation, where she spoke with relatives of the kidnapped and was presented with 42 petitions on missing persons, she said. On this occasion she received only six such petitions, admittedly relating to a shorter time frame. In two of these six cases the missing persons had been located. They were found to have been kidnapped by local militiamen who had subsequently been dismissed from the militia and who were currently under investigation.
Rights-defenders have reported the discovery of a collective grave in the republic; searches are to be launched for similar graves in North Osetia.
Ingushetian civil society activists, such as Musa Pliev, Maksharip Aushev, and Magomed Khazbiev, who were engaged in rights-defence and oppositional activity during Ziazikov’s rule, are working together with the new president. Musa Pliev has become an advisor to Yunus-Bek Yevkurov. Ingushetia is a small republic, where people tend to know one another. The former oppositionists do not have any connection to the armed underground, but they are striving to communicate directly to the fighters the idea that it is essential to cease attacks on militiamen and state officials. By the time the rights-defenders arrived in the republic, no violent actions had been observed there for around 10 days.
Ingushetia is one of 50 federal subjects where a public observation commission for supervising the militia and prisons has been formed, Valerii Borshchev reported. In general, this republic is notable for its civil society, he emphasised, citing the mass collection of signatures of people who did not vote in the elections, although the official turn-out result was 99 percent.
In conversation with the rights-defenders, Yunus-Bek Yevkurov admitted that corruption was Ingushetia’s main problem. Speaking at the press conference, the rights-defenders focused on concrete examples of corruption of which they had become aware during their visit. None of the republic’s major enterprises is operational, and 80 percent of the republic’s budgetary revenue is comprised of grants. Thus, 800 million roubles was released for the construction of stopes in Malgobekskii district; 700 million have been spent, and yet no construction has taken place. Yunus-Bek Yevkurov told the rights-defenders that he had personally visited the district head’s home to see how luxuriously he was living. Elsewhere, money was allocated to build a school, but the school’s foundations have not even been laid.
