CHECHNYA LINKS LIBRARY

Kadyrov bribes refugees to return to Borozdinovskaya

By Timur Aliyev

GROZNY, Chechnya - People who had fled from the Borozdinovskaya village agreed to return home only with the help of a promise of money made by Ramzan Kadyrov, the Moscow-backed Vice-Premier of the Chechen Republic, stated Natalya Estemirova of the Chechen branch of the Russian human rights organization Memorial.

"Ramzan Kadyrov promised to pay 10,000 roubles to each person who would return to the village [Borozdinovskaya]," Nestemirova said, referring to Akhmed Akhmedov, who is in charge of the camp "Nadezhda", where the refugees have been staying for three weeks.

According to official information, the refugees agreed to return after lengthy talks with Ramzan Kadyrov and Dagestani MP Saygid Murtazaliyev.

About nine hundred people from Borozdinovskaya, a village located in northeastern Chechnya and inhabited mostly by Avars, the biggest ethnic group in the neighbouring Dagestan, fled across the administrative border to the refugee camp "Nadezhda" near the Dagestani town of Kizlyar after masked armed people raided their village on June 4, killing one elderly man on the spot and abducting 11 others.

(T)