On the fact of attack on journalists on the border of Chechnya and Ingushetia on March 9 filed a new criminal case on signs of the crime provided by part 3 of article 144 of the criminal code (obstruction of the lawful professional activities of journalists, accompanied with violence against journalists of any damage or destruction of their property), according to the Department of the TFR for Ingushetia.
This case connected in one production with the earlier criminal case the Ministry of internal Affairs on Republic Ingushetia — on the grounds of crimes under articles “hooliganism” and “deliberate destruction or damage of property made from hooligan promptings by an arson” and “robbery”.
Unknown assailants attacked journalists and employees of the “Committee for the prevention of torture” on March 9 at the territory of Ingushetia near the border with Chechnya. People in masks surrounded the minibus in which there were about 20 journalists and human rights defenders, were beaten glass, and when the press tour participants left the transport, they began to beat, and the car was torched.
Among the victims were members of the “Committee for the prevention of torture” Nizhny Novgorod Residents Ivan and Ekaterina Vankova, blogger Michael Solunin and ex-correspondent of “Kommersant”, member NNOOOO New Anton Prusakov, the correspondent of magazine The New Times, the Internet-editions “the Media”, as well as reporters from Sweden and Norway.
One of the injured journalists, the correspondent of “media zones” Egor Skovoroda said that investigators found in a burned out bus of the computers and cameras of journalists. He suggested that the electronics could not fully burn and, most likely, was stolen during the attack.
The next day after the attack, President Vladimir Putin instructed the interior Ministry to clarify the circumstances of attacks on journalists and human rights defenders on their way to Chechnya.
