Fatima Margieva's trial reappointed on March 11

Today, the Tskhinvali hall of judicial sessions hosted the hearing of the case of Fatima Margieva, a teacher of the South-Ossetian State University, accused of illegal purchase and keeping of firearms and explosives.

However the trial that started under presidency of Judge Dmitri Tekhov was stopped soon after opening, since at the moment, when the court presented the defendant's advocate, Margieva made the protest and refused from the services of advocate Albina Gazzaeva right in the courtroom.

"I see this lawyer for the first time; and she has no right to defend my interests, as she had never contacted me before. If I'm accused of leaving the republic, while being under recognizance not to leave, I repeat once again: I'm a sick person and I had to take my treatment in North Ossetia," Ms Margieva said to the court.

She also accused the lawyer appointed to her by the court of absence of legal education and faked lawyer's diploma, and stated that, being a citizen of the Russian Federation, she wanted to have an independent Russian lawyer. She named all the previous judicial sessions as staged performances where the producer was President of South Ossetia.

Lawyer Albina Gazzaeva was cancelled in the courtroom. Judge Dmitri Tekhov agreed to Margieva's request and offered that she invited a Russian lawyer if she had a possibility.

Because of Margieva's request the court postponed its session till March 11. The defendant will stay in custody till then.

Today, the exhibits were brought to the trial - sealed up firearms weapon in cloth bags. The defendant refused to admit her guilt and told the court about her custody conditions.

"I'm a university teacher, and I was placed into a cell with a murderer, a woman who serves her term for a murder and rape of a child. In one prison with us there is a prisoner with open form of tuberculosis, who is coughing up with blood. How can I, a healthy person, stay in one premise with seriously sick patients and criminals?" Margieva asked the court.

Meanwhile, Alan Tedeev, an employee of the Tskhinvali prison, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that Fatima Margieva was transferred to a solitary cell; while inmates with open TB take their regular treatment and stay at a safe distance from Margieva. "She is out of threat of infection," he has emphasized.

In her turn, Albina Gazzaeva is going to sue her former client for slander. "Fatima Margieva publicly accused me of ignorance and named my lawyer's diploma faked. I'm going to bring an action against her for slander," she told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent and explained that back in Soviet time she finished a legal college in Central Asia and later - the department of jurisprudence of the South-Ossetian State University.