Human rights defender Igor Kalyapin attacked in Grozny

The head of the "Committee for the Prevention of Torture" Igor Kalyapin was attacked in Grozny on the evening of 16 March. According to Dmitry Utukin, an employee of the organization, the attack took place near the hotel "Grozny-City".

The head of the "Committee for the Prevention of Torture" Igor Kalyapin was attacked in Grozny on the evening of 16 March. According to Dmitry Utukin, an employee of the organization, the attack took place near the hotel "Grozny-City".

Later Kalyapin told RBC that he was being interrogated in the police; he had not been examined by physicians, but "the head is intact, as for the arms and legs it is not yet known."

"I know nothing about the attack on Kalyapin. He checked out of the hotel of his own accord. Sorry, I would like to continue with my work, if you do not mind," – that is what a young man who introduced himself as the hotel administrator told "Mediazona".

Previously the director of this very hotel did not let the Ingush policemen along with their Chechen colleagues who came to inspect the rooms of the journalists and human rights defenders – victims of the attack on the border between the two republics.

Kalyapin was beaten and pelted with eggs. Prior to that, according to Utukin, the hotel administrator came to Kalyapin's room with armed police and evicted him from the hotel.

The head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, has repeatedly criticized Igor Kalyapin. In particular, he accused him of financing Caucasian militants. Kadyrov claimed that human rights defenders have nothing to do in Chechnya. In December 2014, Igor Kalyapin, at that time the head of the Committee against Torture, addressed a statement to the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation and the General Prosecutor's Office against Ramzan Kadyrov, the head of Chechnya. He did so after Kadyrov promised to expel relatives of militants from the Republic and destroy their homes. Shortly thereafter, the office of human rights activists of the Committee against Torture in Grozny located in an apartment in a residential building was set on fire.