A Circassian activist living outside of Russia has been put on the wanted list

The Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs has put a native of Kabardino-Balkaria, Circassian activist Martin Kochesokov on the wanted list. He was previously recognized as a "foreign agent".

In mid-2024, a criminal case was opened against Kochesokov for failure to fulfill the duties of a "foreign agent". The issue was the lack of appropriate marking in his publications on social networks. It is known that today he lives outside of the Russian Federation.

According to the Russian Ministry of Justice, Kochesokov "participated in the dissemination of messages and materials of foreign agents, made calls for actions, the results of which could lead to a violation of the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation."

In 2021, Martin Kochesokov, being the head of the public organization "Khabze", received a three-year suspended sentence for drug possession. He was detained on June 7, 2019, in the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic on the Kavkaz highway; marijuana was allegedly found in his car. The activist himself insisted on his innocence - according to him, the drugs were planted on him by security forces. He spent several months in a pretrial detention center and under house arrest.

Human rights activists claim that Kochesokov's persecution was related to his public position, calls for studying the national languages ​​of the peoples living in the Russian Federation, as well as for holding popular elections of regional leaders instead of appointing them from Moscow.

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