Rights defenders treat practice of non-issuance passports to Chechen women as widespread

The intensified control over women in Chechnya has led to refusals to issue foreign passports to local women without guarantees of other family members. This practice grossly violates the law and human rights, human rights defenders assert.

The "Caucasian Knot" has described the fate of female natives of Chechnya who decided to run away because of domestic violence. Thus, a Chechen woman, who resisted many years of violence from her husband and father, left Russia with four children. The story of Khalimat Taramova ended with a forced return home to Chechnya.

In Chechnya, an adult woman was denied a foreign passport needed for travelling abroad without the presence of a family member, the SK SOS Crisis Group has reported. The woman was asked to come with a male relative to fill out some "guarantee."

However, there are no legal grounds for such requirements, since all the adults have the right to independently receive documents.

In 2015, Magomed Alamov from the Anti-Torture Team* and Abubakar Yangulbaev, a lawyer, reported that girls had been detained under the pretext that they would leave for Syria, Svetlana Anokhina, a human rights defender, has informed.

"But now few people are fleeing to Syria ... this is done for a different reason; and Chechen authorities have decided that it's necessary to control women," she has added.

At checkpoints, "a car with Chechen license plates can be stopped, if a woman is driving," Ms Anokhina has noted.

Valery Borschov, a member of the Moscow Helsinki Group**, has noted that older relatives, regardless of their status, most often have power over younger ones, regardless of gender.