Alan Chochiev considers himself to be first political prisoner in Russia

We call your attention to some extracts from the statement of October 29 made by the arrested South Osetian public figure Alan Chochiev.

"Yesterday, October 28, I finally got a copy of the court decision of October 16 according to which I had been committed to prison. And now I have two legal documents - decisions of the civil and criminal courts - regarding one and the same event that is formulated in both the court decisions as a "human rights antifascist action in the form of an antifascist hunger strike". This sole fact is enough to affirm that I must not be considered as a criminal by the standards of international and domestic law and tradition of the Russian Federation! It is quite obvious now that the case of Alan Chochiev is a political one!!! I congratulate the law-enforcement system of the Republic of North Osetia - Alania on it. It succeeded in making the first political prisoner in new Russia of me as Khodorkovsky was arrested ten days later and the court qualifies his deeds without distinct political indicators."

"The only thing which follows from this is that the Prosecutor's Offices of the Republic of North Osetia - Alania is the first one in the Russian Federation and in the whole world that managed to arrest an antifascist for his intention to conduct a human rights antifascist action."