abducted

14th February 2005: Chechen human rights defender Mahmut Magomad, abducted on 20 January, has finally reappeared. Front Line is awaiting further information on Mahmut Magomad's health and whether he has been ill-treated while in captivity.

Mahmut Magomad was abducted on 20th January by a group of camouflaged gunmen in front of his wife and children At the time of his abduction, Mr. Magomad was working on over 30 human rights cases, mainly concerning 'disappearances', torture and ill-treatment, and extra-judicial executions committed by Russian security forces. Read about the abduction of Mahmut Magomad

Front Line has received a further report of an attack against the Centre for Human Rights Legal Action (CALDH), an organisation which has already been the subject of two urgent appeals sent by Front Line to the Guatemalan authorities. According to the latest report, on 11 September 2004 Mario Minera, the coordinator of CALDH’s Programme for Democratic Development, was abducted at gunpoint by two men in Guatemala City. They reportedly tied him up and threatened to kill him if he did not obey their orders and forced him in to the vehicle they were driving. He was held for half an hour during which time all his personal belongings as well as documents related to his work with CALDH were searched through. When he was released, the men returned his personal belongings but said that the CALDH documents "would be sent on later."

In view of the attacks suffered by members of CALDH in July and August this year,Front Line is seriously concerned for their safety and calls on the Guatemalan authorities to ensure their protection in accordance with the U.N Declaration on Human Rights Defenders.

Human rights defender Imran Ezhiev, head of the Information Centre of the Society of Russian-Chechen Friendship in Chechnya (SRFC) in the Northern Caucasus, is allegedly at grave risk due to his investigation of the recent kidnapping and assassination of his colleague Aslan Davletukaev, whose dead body was reportedly discovered on 16 January 2004, bearing evidence of torture and mutilation.

On 26 January 2004, it was reported that the house and workplace of Mr. Ezhiev in Ingushetia were being watched by unidentified individuals. It was also reported that he was being followed by unidentified individuals driving four cars without license plates. Cars without license plates have allegedly been used in the past to kidnap Chechen refugees, and there are concerns that when road police don't stop a car without number plates, it because it belongs to the security service of the pro-Moscow president of Chechnya, Akhmad Kadyrov.