June 25, 2001
***
At about 20:00, on the northwestern outskirts of the village of Tsotsin-Yurt, Kurchaloy District, near a gas station, employees of Russian law enforcement agencies detained Muslo Magomedovich Ediev, born in 1964, the father of three minor children. His relative Said-Emin Ediev, born in 1950, as well as Magomed Dugaev, born in 1961, Ibragim Djunidovich Khamzarov, born in 1953, and Aslanbek Mezhiev, born in 1972 All these people worked in private security in the city of Argun (according to other sources, they just got a job there).
They pulled up to the car wash and stood in line. An armored personnel carrier soon arrived here. The soldiers who were on his armor demanded documents from Muslo Ediev and his companions and, quickly reviewing them, stated that the “curfew” regime had allegedly been violated and therefore it was necessary to go with them to the nearest military unit.
Following the armored personnel carrier, the car headed for the territory of the former agricultural brigade next to the checkpoint where the Russian military was stationed.
According to eyewitnesses, relatives were informed about their detention that same night, but they did not do anything, since it was late. And the next morning we learned that Muslo Ediev and his companions had been captured by the FSB. This, in particular, was stated by a military man who introduced himself as "Sergey", the head of the checkpoint. Promising to meet with the "commander", he himself led the women to the territory occupied by the military unit, and called some officer. A thin, tall man of about 40 came up. He suggested calling himself "Alexander".
He stated that the people they captured allegedly "were drunk." When they objected to him that, for example, Muslo Ediev never drank in his life, he said that his leaders should come from Khankala and after that, apparently, the detainees would be released. He acknowledged that they were still on the territory of the brigade.
However, they were not released that day or the next. On the fourth day, the relatives learned through "Sergei" that they had been taken to Kurchaloy. (According to other sources, at first they were taken to Khankala, where they were severely beaten, and only then they were taken to the regional center.) Then they were in the military commander's office of the district, located in this village, for about a month.
Muslo and Said-Emin Ediev, Magomed Dugaev and two other residents of Tsotsin-Yurt, who were captured along with them, were allowed food and clothing by the commandant's office. Notes were sent to them through the guards more than once. They wrote back as well.
Negotiations were held with the military for 28 days on the terms of their release. On July 24, relatives of the detainees handed over "payoffs": six machine guns and two Stechkin pistols. The weapons were bought from the military checkpoint at the entrance to Tsotsin-Yurt.
Immediately after that, four people were released from the commandant's office, but Muslo Ediev was not among them. For some reason, the military promised to let him go only in the evening. After waiting at the commandant's office for several hours, the relatives returned home: it was dangerous to stay in a foreign settlement during the "curfew" period.
The next morning, Russian army units blockaded Tsotsin-Yurt. The “cleansing” that began in it continued until the evening of July 27. None of the relatives of the man who was still in the commandant's office could go to the district center and find out whether he was released or not.
When on July 28 they nevertheless reached Kurchaloy, a military acquaintance who had previously received parcels for prisoners from them (his name was also Sergei) stated that on July 26 he personally took Muslo Ediev out of the cell and escorted him to his superiors. To whom specifically, he did not specify (relatives, however, believe that Sergei was talking about the military commandant of the Kurchaloevsky district, Leontiev), but said that he knew nothing about the future fate of this person.
At the end of 2002, the whereabouts of Muslo Magomedovich Ediev had not been established. His relatives wrote applications to the prosecutor's office, to the bureau of Vladimir Kalamanov, special representative of the President of the Russian Federation for observance of human and civil rights and freedoms in Chechnya, appealed to the civil administration of the republic, etc. They visited prisons in the south of Russia, in particular in Rostov-on-Don, but they did not manage to find out anything. On the fact of his abduction (Article 126 part 2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) on June 21, 2002, the Kurchaloy District Prosecutor's Office opened criminal case No. 75057. On August 21, on the basis of Art. 195 p. 3 Code of Criminal Procedure of the RSFSR, it was suspended.
From the book "People Live Here", Usam Baisaev, Dmitry Grushkin, 2006
