Federal officials open investigation into reported abduction and torture of Amnesty International researcher in Ingushetia

According to the Committee Against Torture, Russia’s Federal Investigative Committee opened a criminal investigation on December 3 into the October abduction of Amnesty International researcher and opposition activist Oleg Kozlovsky, who says Ingush anti-extremist police officers detained him, undressed him, beat him, and threatened him with blackmail and rape, if he refused to cooperate. Kozlovsky says he was even subjected to a ”mock execution” in a field, before he was dumped at a local airport and told to forget what had happened, or else his children would be murdered.

Kovslovsky was in Ingushetia to observe protests against an unpopular territorial agreement with Chechnya. Ingush leader Yunus-bek Yevkurov, who has championed the border deal, accused him of staging the abduction and torture as a ”provocation.”