Titiev's defence treats law enforcers' testimonies as useless

All the nine employees of the Kurchaloi ROVD (District Interior Division), questioned today at the court session that considers the case of Oyub Titiev, the head of the Grozny office of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial", said that they had not detained him and had not examined his car.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that the above nine witnesses arrived today at Oyub Titiev's trial. The court decided that the recording of the process could threaten the security of the witnessing policemen.

All of the witnesses have told the court that they had not participated in the detention of Oyub Titiev; had not inspected his car and had not taken anything from there, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports.

After the July 26 court session, Titiev's defence stated that the policemen's testimonies given at the preliminary investigation were same word by word; however, the prosecution witnesses, in their turn, rejected any allegations of coordinated testimonies.

Alexander Cherkasov, the Chairman of the Board of the Human Rights Organization "Memorial", told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that he feels vexing for the witnesses in Titiev's case. "It is seen how this wise and cunning Chechen men with dignity are uncomfortable when answering questions during the interrogation," Mr Cherkasov has explained.

He has added that the statement of the Russian delegation to the UN sitting that there are no violations in Titiev's case is just formal. "In fact, these UN hearings are a continuous answer of the type 'a check has been made; no violations revealed' to all the questions that the Russian delegation is asked; this answer is a trifle amongst other things. It will not have any special impact on Oyub's case. We see that the trial is rolling along a completely indecent trajectory," Alexander Cherkasov has stated.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on August 1, 2018 at 08:41 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.