US journalist's assistant detained in Chechnya

Ruslan Sopakhanov, who assisted US journalist Rebecca Santana when she worked in Chechnya, was detained and taken away in an unknown direction, reported the journalist herself. His family "does not know where he is and what is happening with him."

According to Ms Santana, Ruslan Sopakhanov, a resident of the Chechen Republic, worked with her for four days as a driver helping her collect information. After the journalist's departure for Moscow on February 12, he was detained by unknown people. "It was not clear whether they were police or FSB (Federal Security Service) officers as they did not show their documents and did not say where they had come from." Rebecca Santana rates Ruslan Sopakhanov's detention as a "punishment or warning for those who help foreign journalists."

Speaking on the attitude of law-enforcement agencies to her, Ms Santana said a stranger, who had refused to show his documents, had talked to her in Mozdok. He "wanted to know where she had traveled and whom she had met." Her "writing-books, mobile phone, camera, and films", i.e. everything except for personal belongings, were seized from her. Later, in Moscow, she was given the professional equipment back, but "the films had already been developed."

Editors note: See also the article "US journalist found in North Caucasus".