Protests in Ingushetia: the ban on the rally and criminal cases

Rally in Magas on March 26 / Photo: Fortangorg

How began

Less than 500 thousand people live in Ingushetia, it became part of Russia at the end of the 18th century. The Ingush were among the peoples that Joseph Stalin deported in the 40s. The theme of the borders of the republic remains important and painful for local residents. In 1992, there were armed clashes between the Ingush and the inhabitants of North Ossetia. Then more than 600 people were killed, mostly Ingush.

Ingushetia also has territorial disputes with Chechnya, which is headed by an influential Ramzan Kadyrov. In 2013-2014, they led to the skirmishes of security forces from Chechnya and Ingushetia. On September 26, 2018, the heads of the republics Ramzan Kadyrov and Yunus Bek Evkurov signed an agreement on the settlement of the border. The Ingush took him as unprofitable for them.

In October 2018, many thousands of protests began in Ingushetia. By the end of the year, they came to naught. At first they tried to pursue the participants in rallies, but then the persecution was stopped . In the fall of 2018, Ingushetia was without violence.

Rally and clashes

A new wave of protests in Ingushetia began at the end of March 2019. On March 28, the Ingush parliament was supposed to consider the new edition of the Republican Law on the referendum in the second reading.

In the proposed version, the paragraph that a popular referendum should have disappeared questions about changing the borders of the republic. This caused mass discontent.

On March 26, a new rally was appointed. By this time, the bill was withdrawn, but the protests did not stop. Now among the requirements is the resignation of the head of the republic. Yunus Bek Evkurov has been led by Ingushetia since 2008. There are no direct elections of the head of the region in the republic, his candidacy was first introduced by Dmitry Medvedev, then Vladimir Putin was approved in the local parliament.

The new rally was agreed on March 26. On the eve of the evening of March 25, a message appeared on the website of the Ingush Investigative Committee that a criminal case has been instituted for calls for riots on Instagram. Is there a suspect in this case is still unknown.

The rally on March 26 also gathered thousands of participants. During its holding in Magas, interruptions in the work of the Internet took place. Some of the protesters remained to spend the night in the square, during the night they tried to disperse them three times.

- In October, there were a lot of people in the square, including at night, the authorities did not dare to use force. Now, when there was an attempt to accelerate, there were literally a couple of hundred people on the square. The rally itself was completely calm. The first attempt to disperse the audience was made at about five in the morning, when part of the nights rose to pray. In the vast majority, the security forces, seconded to Ingushetia, were attacked, but among them were people from the guard of Yevkurov, ”says OVD-info Ruslan Mutsolgov, the leader of the Youth Yabloko youth in Ingushetia.

On March 27, protesters left the square. Their leaders said they received guarantees from the authorities that on Monday, April 1, they will be allowed to rally again. Leaving the square briefly blocked the Caucasus federal highway. On March 28, a night protest rake was held in Magas.

The reaction of the authorities and the plans of the protesters

- There is no information about the arrested yet. Due to the confrontation at the rally, arrests and repression are possible in what format it will take place, it is difficult to say. All the people are now waiting for how events will develop. On the street there are more than usual police officers, the situation is intense-says the OVD-info, Magomed Barakhoev, the head of the legal initiative human rights organization.

At the end of last week, the Russian Guard - its competence includes maintaining order at rallies and monitoring how citizens store firearms - arranged a massive check of owners of traumatic and hunting weapons in Ingushetia.

-Since March 25, armored vehicles and units of the Russian Guard from Moscow, St. Petersburg and other regions have been pulled into the republic. There is unofficial information about divisions from other North Caucasian regions. Representatives of the top leadership of the Russian Guard came to Ingushetia for several days. Everything is going to prevent anyone from holding any shares, ”continues Ruslan Mutsolgov.

In the first half of the day of Sunday, a refusal was received to hold a new rally in the interval from April 5 to 9. The authorities refer to the fact that the deadlines for filing a notification were violated. The promise to allow a new rally on April 1 is no longer remembered. Mutsolgov noted in a conversation with the OVD-Info that on Thursday and Friday the application for the rally was not accepted: "Either the receipt of documents is up to three hours, they asked to wait, wait, and then they said that there was no one."

On the morning of April 1, the organizers of the protests called on supporters to remain calm and promised that they would achieve permission to hold a new rally. Among the police in Ingushetia, dismissal began . According to Mutsolgov, the police are fired, who got up with a live chain between the security forces and the protesters during the confrontation. The head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ingushetia was also resigned.

In addition, some activists on Sunday received summons for interrogations to the Investigative Committee. On April 1, the SK announced the initiation of a criminal case on the use of violence to ten employees of the Russian Guard and the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

- Evkurov does not say that it was necessary to figure out whether there was or was not a crime, but demands to punish the organizers of the rally on March 26. Evkurov is on the platoon, perhaps he is crushed from the Kremlin, because he proved himself as a triumph of popular calm, ”Mutsolgov notes.