Alleged members of Basayev's detachment are to be sentenced to 25 and 28 years

At a hearing of the Southern District Military Court in Rostov, the state prosecutor demanded that Takhir Begeldiev and Vakhit Khamzatkhanov be sentenced to 25 and 28 years in prison. They are accused of shooting Russian servicemen during the second Russian-Chechen war. The defendants did not admit their guilt.

According to the investigation, the defendants, as part of the detachment of field commanders Shamil Basayev and Khattab, fired at servicemen of the Russian Ministry of Defense on October 4, 1999 in the village of Chervlennaya in the Shelkovsky District of Chechnya. 15 of them were killed, and another 28 were wounded.

Takhir Begeldiev and Vakhit Khamzatkhanov are accused of armed rebellion, attempted murder of military personnel and participation in a gang (Articles 279, 317 and 209 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). Investigators continue to search for the remaining members of the group.

According to human rights activists, criminal cases against participants in the Russian-Chechen wars are biased from the start. Usually, the prosecution witnesses are classified persons, often the same ones. Sometimes, under pressure and the threat of torture, confessions are forced on persons serving sentences in places of detention and who have never seen the accused before.

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