Rights defenders issue report on domestic violence victims in Northern Caucasus

The problem of domestic violence affects women of different ages, but mostly young women under 30 try to escape from it. However, they face threats of losing contact with their children, who remain in families with their fathers; besides, the problem of "honour killings" is pressing, human rights defenders have indicated in the report "Evacuation of domestic violence victims from Dagestan, Ingushetia and Chechnya."

Yulia Antonova, a lawyer, Inna Airapetyan, a psychologist, Valentina Likhoshva, a psychologist, and the "Ad Rem" team have published, for the first time in Russian practice, a qualitative study about the evacuation of domestic violence victims in Northern Caucasus, as indicated in the annotation to the report. A total of 33 respondents took part in the study.

The authors have named specific risk factors for Chechnya and Ingushetia. "In these republics, by tradition, after a divorce, children remain with their fathers, since they are considered to "belong" to their fathers' clans ... In Chechnya, Ingushetia and Dagestan, there is still a risk of women being killed for "honour" reasons in situations where they are suspected of extramarital links and other "inappropriate" behaviour," the report says.

"The brothers scared me ... that they would take me away, divorce me, take away my children and give me out to my husband and his family. And they would lock me at home, dress me in a hijab and I would not work. Or they would kill me," said an Ingush woman.

"Sometimes policemen simply prefer not to intervene ... or they hand the girl over to her relatives ... or they ignore the beatings," said one the activist who helps girls escape persecution by their relatives.

Law enforcers often side with the relatives, who are trying to return fugitives. "Policemen caught me forcibly in the city of Bratsk. Then, they waited for my father to arrive. He came and took me," said one female victim from Chechnya.