Four days in advance of the international conference, workshops and annual meeting of the Human Rights House Network, one of the delegates, Stanislav Dmitrivsky from the Russian-Chechen Friendship Society, a delegate to the meeting, received a summons from Russian police and will not be able to attend. It is assumed that the arrest was prompted by fear that Dmitrivsky would seek asylum in Azerbaijan. (2-SEP-5)
What follows is a slightly edted version of the message received by the HRH secretariat today, accompanied by a plea for help, and sent by another attending human rights NGO, the International Service for Human Rights (ISHR):
On 1 September 2005 at about 11.10 am Stanislav Dmitrievsky was stopped by two militiamen of the patrol force when he was going to work who made an attempt to detain him. Dmitirievsky was stopped in Sovetskaya Square not far from the building where the offices of the Russian-Chechen Friendship Society (the organisation he works for) are situated. The militiamen started asking him why he had such strange eyes and why he was walking in such a strange way. Then they asked him whether he had had any alcohol in the morning. The militiamen then ordered Dmitrievsky to show his passport, and examined it for quite a long time. They also asked him where he worked. Dmitrievsky?s own impression was that the militiamen were trying to find a reason to detain me and if he hadn?t had his passport, he would have been detained for that.
-After all, I asked the militiamen whether they had any other questions or claims, Dmitrievsky told yesterday. -One of the militiamen said no and permitted me to go to work. I suspect this episode had to do with RCFS?s intention to hold a picket in front of the tax inspection building on 2 September. However, I can?t state anything for sure as today is 1 September and the militia is carrying out their usual raid against drunk people. They surely have received some special orders on how many alcoholics and people who resemble Chechen terrorists they should detain.
-The plan for the picket is as follows: On 2 September at 3 pm RCSF is holding a picket in front of the building of the tax inspection of Nizhegorodsky district of Nizhny Novgorod situated at the address 52a Il?inskaya Street. The aim of the picket is to express disagreement to what is, in our opinion, an unlawful decision to impose income tax on the assets received by a public organization to implement projects. We intend to demonstrate our contempt for this decision to the staff at the tax inspection offices.
Today Stanislav Dmitrievsky received summons from the prosecutor?s office to come to the chief investigator Oleg Kiryukov who is going to charge him under part 1 of Article 282 of the the Russian Federation?s Criminal Code (inciting to ethnic hatred) and to interrogate him as a charged offender. Dmitrievsky is to be charged at 11 am tomorrow. Yesterday famous Russian human right advocates including Sergey Kovalyov and Lyudmila Alekseeva signed an ?Open Letter on RCFS?s Persecution?. In this letter, Kovalyov, Alekseeva and others expressed their deep concern about the harassment the RCFS has been subjected to by different state bodies.
