Russia detained two Chechens – Bekkhan Mulkoev and Husein Alkhanov, at the Georgian-Russian border on February 19, Russian media reported on February 25.
Bekkhan Mulkoev and Husein Alkhanov are those two Chechens, which disappeared in Georgia after being acquitted by a Tbilisi court on February 6 of having violated border regulations and entered Georgia illegally.
Russia claims Mulkoev and Alkhanov are the Chechen militants, which fought against the Federal Troops in Chechnya.
A group of Chechen refugees living in Georgia’s Pankisi Gorge staged a demonstration on February 18 to protest the disappearances of two Chechens, Bekkhan Mulkoev and Husein Alkhanov.
The relatives of the two men acquitted fear they have been abducted and secretly handed over to Russia by the Georgian authorities. After the report regarding their detention, doubts over the alleged secret extradition increased, however officials in Georgia deny speculations.
Two Chechens were among a group of 13 Chechens arrested by the Georgian border guards in the late summer of 2002, five of whom were forcibly extradited to Russia.
The delegation of the European Court for Human Rights (ECHR) paid a fact-finding visit to Georgia this week to study the cases of 13 Chechens.
After a hearing on 16 September 2003, the ECHR declared admissible the application lodged by 13 Chechens, which claim that extradition of five compatriots was illegal.
Mysterious disappearance of Bekkhan Mulkoev and Husein Alkhanov was not a first case in Georgia. On February 12, 2003 Chechen refugee Adam Talalov disappeared after leaving his home in the Pankisi Gorge. His whereabouts remain unknown yet.
The whereabouts of Chechen refugee Hussein Yusupov, who disappeared in 2002 after allegedly being released from a Security Ministry’s detention facility, remained unknown, and there were no developments in the case so far.