Rights defenders point to importance to prove torture of Caucasian natives in Saratov

The video proofs of torture of residents of Chechnya, Dagestan, Georgia and Azerbaijan in the regional tuberculosis hospital No. 1 in Saratov gives hope that the perpetrators will be punished; however, in other Russian institutions the situation is similar, the human rights defenders interviewed by the "Caucasian Knot" have stated.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on November 9, the human rights project "Gulagu.net" posted video proofs of violence and torture against patients from the Caucasus at the Saratov prison hospital.

Irina Biryukova, a lawyer for the NGO "Public Verdict"*, hopes that those guilty of using torture at the Saratov prison hospital will be punished.

"I'd like all the perpetrators to be punished, but let's see how the investigative actions will be conducted. Judging by the way they work, they have no intention to prosecute those guilty. We see no arrests; and only a few persons have been detained," Ms Biryukova has noted.

Magomed Alamov, the head of the North-Caucasian branch of the Committee against Torture (CaT), does not exclude that violence is also used in other prison hospitals in Russia.

"I fully admit that violence is also used in other hospitals against the prisoners who somehow fail to please the administration or the staff of the institution, where they are kept. And, probably, the situation is even worse than in the above Saratov hospital," Mr Alamov told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

*The organization has been included by the Russian Ministry of Justice into the register of the non-profit organizations (NPOs) performing the functions of a foreign agent.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on November 10, 2021 at 08:08 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.