Sending to death? Belarus bars Chechen-born athlete from asking for asylum, expels him


The Belarusian authorities prevented Chechen-born MMA fighter Murad Amriyev from applying for political asylum in Belarus and helped in delivering him to Russia.

“They do not give me the right to a lawyer, they do not let me exercise my right to attorney! I am not allowed to do anything! They do not let anyone see me and talk to me! I want to get political asylum here. And they do not give me such an opportunity, you know? Everyone ignores me. They do not listen to me at all. Tell people that they are in collusion. No one wants to listen to me, neither boss, nor his subordinates. I’m not allowed to make a phone call. I have spent 24 hours here, and they have not let me do anything!” Murad Amriyev, who was kept in a local police station, managed to shout to a journalist of Russia’s TV Rain.

Russian citizen Murad Amriyev, who earlier reported torture in Chechnya was detained in the Belarusian town of Dobrush overnight into Thursday. The MMA fighter claims that Chechnya’s police top official vowed blood vengeance against him.

Amriyev, a world champion in Mixed Martial Arts, left Russia in 2013. According to him, Kadyrov-controlled security forces arrested beat and tortured him in Grozny, trying to reach his elder brother who had fleed to Germany. When he was going to Moscow to apply for a visa, he was detained  on suspicion of using forged documents in Bryansk. Forgery in Amriyev’s documents is said to be a mistake made by Chechen officials – his year of birth in the passport is listed as 1986 instead of 1985. But still, he iss on the federal wanted list.

On June 6, Amriyev was formally released and taken to the transport prosecutor’s office for questioning. In the building he saw some Chechen policemen including one of those who tortured him four years ago. The athlete managed to escape and travelled to Belarus, where he was arrested.

On Thursday evening, six cars left the premises of Dobrush, lawyer Pyotr Zaikin told RBC.

“We went after them. But two cars left us behind, we lost them. He must have been delivered to Russian security officials. In fact, this is extradition,” said the lawyer.

The Belarusian Prosecutor’s Office confirmed the fact of delivering Murad Amriyev to Russia stressing that it was not ‘extradition’.

Human rights defenders and family have a strong presumption that Amriyev’ may be torchured and killed when he is taken to Chechnya. Murad Amriyev’s mother appealed to Belarus president Alyaksandr Lukashenka asking him no save her son, but there was no response.

(UPD) According to news agency Interfax, Murad Amriyev has been already delivered to representatives of Chechnya’s Interior Ministry.

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