September 9, 2001

***
A Russian military vehicle was blown up in the forest near the village of Bachi-Yurt; among those who were in it, there are victims. Immediately after the explosion, several armored personnel carriers began patrolling the nearby area. On a country road leading from Bachi-Yurt to the village of Novogroznensky, a local resident of Kirgizbai-Magomed Elsunkaev, born in 1958, did not have time to pull over to the side of the road in time and his car ended up between two armored personnel carriers. They opened fire on her without any warning from machine guns. The driver was wounded in the neck and died the same day.

Russian troops captured 17 residents of Bachi-Yurt, who were mowing grass nearby, and two workers at a water pump located on the outskirts of this settlement. All of them were taken to the regional center. One of the detainees is a 14-year-old teenager. According to relatives, they were interrogated by the FSB department.
Ten people were released that night during the curfew. Thus, the lives of the liberated people were exposed to additional danger.

***
In the village of Sherdy-Mokhk, during the “cleansing” operation, the Russian military detained 18 local residents; 14 of them were severely beaten and soon released. Four were released only after a week. At the place of detention, which was a military unit stationed in the village of Engenoy, they were subjected to torture.

***
After 9 o'clock, the Russian military fired from automatic weapons at a group of residents of the village of Verkhniy Alkun, who, in agreement with the military, went out to mow hay in a nearby field. At the time of the shelling, in addition to eight men, there were also three women with three children aged 8 to 10 years. For an hour, while the shooting was going on, they lay in a small depression, pressing closely to the ground. However, Albert Umarovich Kuraev, born in 1984, was wounded in the legs.

The military explained their actions by saying that they were allegedly attacked. Employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ingushetia began an investigation into the incident. But for some reason they began to look for the perpetrators of the crime among the victims. Perhaps because no other signs of the attack or attackers were found. On the same day, the men who were on the field, with the exception of the wounded man, were taken to the Sunzhenskoye District Department of Internal Affairs and placed in cells for three days. There they were forced to write explanatory notes, they were photographed, fingerprinted, and then released on their own recognizance.

On September 23, in the district hospital in the village of Ordzhonikidzevskaya, Rustam Saitov, who came from Grozny to care for the wounded Albert Kuraev, was detained. The police also asked the doctors about Salambek Daudovich Khadisov, a refugee from Chechnya who was temporarily living in Verkhny Alkun (10 Severnaya St.), and who was among the mowers at the time of the shelling. Having learned about this, he himself came to the Sunzhensky District Department of Internal Affairs and was taken into custody. In the cell where he was placed, Islam Isaevich Tsechoev, born in 1977, a resident of the Republic of Ingushetia, was already sitting, detained on suspicion of attacking the military. The next day, both were handed over to employees of the mobile detachment of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation stationed in the city of Karabulak. They were taken to a military unit on the border with the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania, and from there, after several hours of beatings and humiliation, they were taken by helicopter to the village of Khankala and placed in a pit.

After some time, Salambek Khadisov and Islam Tsechoev began to be taken for “interrogations.” Without introducing themselves or presenting documents, the military subjected them to torture and beatings for three days, seeking agreement to cooperate. On the morning of the fourth day they were forced to sign papers, from which it followed that no violence had been used against them, and after that they were transferred to the temporary detention center at the VOVD of the Leninsky district of Grozny. They spent 15 days there. On October 12, they were taken outside the gates of the VOVD and, saying: “Go away, you are free,” they were released.

***
From the city of Shali, the Russian military took Said-Magomed Turpal-Alievich Mutsukaev, born in 1976, a local resident, to an unknown direction. Based on the fact of his abduction (Article 126 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), on September 25, 2001, the prosecutor's office of the Shalinsky district opened criminal case No. 23240. Two months later it was suspended.
Relatives of the abducted person did not only contact law enforcement agencies. In a statement submitted to one of the human rights organizations, his characteristics are given: “height is 175 cm, black hair, a scar under his nose.” Memorial Human Rights Center does not have information about his release.

From the book “People Live Here”, Usam Baysaev, Dmitry Grushkin, 2006.