"Novaya Gazeta" describes method of extrajudicial executions in Chechnya

In January 2017, the victims of extrajudicial executions were strangled with a rope in the basement of the barrack of the patrol-and-post service police regiment named after Akhmat Kadyrov in Grozny, the "Novaya Gazeta" reports.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on July 9, 2017, the "Novaya Gazeta" wrote that in Chechnya, on January 26, 2017, the persons detained after the attack on policemen in Grozny on December 17, 2016, were executed. On July 23, 2019, rights defenders presented testimonies of witnesses of the detentions and disappearances of people from the "execution list".

On January 26, 2017, at least 13 people were brought to the barrack of the above police regiment named after Akhmat Kadyrov in Grozny; then they were taken in turn to the basement room for execution, says the publication by Elena Milashina. The first of the detainees was shot dead; the rest were strangled so as not to stain the room where soldiers of the regiment were training, says the article.

"Other detainees were laid on the floor; four people pressed them to the floor; a rope was passed under the neck; and one of the officers stepped on the detainee's nape and tightened the rope around his neck," Ms Milashina wrote, noting that during the executions, in the next room Chechen law enforcers were playing table tennis.

The article names only one of those executed – Aslan Dasaev. He was announced in international search as a suspect of links with Syrian militants.