Zura Bitiyeva
Encyclopedia
Zura Bitiyeva (also transliterated as Bitieva) was a locally well-known Chechen
Chechen people
Chechens constitute the largest native ethnic group originating in the North Caucasus region. They refer to themselves as Noxçi . Also known as Sadiks , Gargareans, Malkhs...

 human rights
Human rights
Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...

 activist who was extrajudicially executed by a Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

n government death squad
Death squad
A death squad is an armed military, police, insurgent, or terrorist squad that conducts extrajudicial killings, assassinations, and forced disappearances of persons as part of a war, insurgency or terror campaign...

 in 2003 after she complained to the European Court of Human Rights
European Court of Human Rights
The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg is a supra-national court established by the European Convention on Human Rights and hears complaints that a contracting state has violated the human rights enshrined in the Convention and its protocols. Complaints can be brought by individuals or...

 of ill treatment during an earlier illegal detention. Three other members of her immediate family were also killed in the same attack.

Bitiyeva's was not an isolated case and many people in Chechnya
Chechnya
The Chechen Republic , commonly referred to as Chechnya , also spelled Chechnia or Chechenia, sometimes referred to as Ichkeria , is a federal subject of Russia . It is located in the southeastern part of Europe in the Northern Caucasus mountains. The capital of the republic is the city of Grozny...

 who have submitted cases of serious human rights violations to the ECHR have been also subjected to reprisals, including being killed or forcibly disappeared
Forced disappearance
In international human rights law, a forced disappearance occurs when a person is secretly abducted or imprisoned by a state or political organization or by a third party with the authorization, support, or acquiescence of a state or political organization, followed by a refusal to acknowledge the...

.

Life

Bitiyeva was born in 1948 in Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan , officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Ranked as the ninth largest country in the world, it is also the world's largest landlocked country; its territory of is greater than Western Europe...

 during the forced exile of entire Chechen nation. Later she returned to Chechnya, settling in the village of Kalinovskaya (Kalinovskaia). During the First Chechen War
First Chechen War
The First Chechen War, also known as the War in Chechnya, was a conflict between the Russian Federation and the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, fought from December 1994 to August 1996...

, she was actively involved in anti-war
Anti-war
An anti-war movement is a social movement, usually in opposition to a particular nation's decision to start or carry on an armed conflict, unconditional of a maybe-existing just cause. The term can also refer to pacifism, which is the opposition to all use of military force during conflicts. Many...

 protests. In February 2000, during the Second Chechen War
Second Chechen War
The Second Chechen War, in a later phase better known as the War in the North Caucasus, was launched by the Russian Federation starting 26 August 1999, in response to the Invasion of Dagestan by the Islamic International Peacekeeping Brigade ....

, she and her son Idris were arbitrarily detained by the Russian forces and taken to the unofficial detention centre known as Chernokozovo
Chernokozovo
Chernokozovo is a small village in Naursky District of northern Chechnya which is a site of an infamous Russian prison.-Chernokozovo prison:Chernokozovo prison is a former Soviet-era maximum-security penitentiary facility...

, a "filtration camp" infamous of torture, rape and other abuses. When she has arrived at Chernokozovo, the guards told her she would "never leave alive." Bitiyeva, who tried to defend other prisoners, went on hunger strike
Hunger strike
A hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance or pressure in which participants fast as an act of political protest, or to provoke feelings of guilt in others, usually with the objective to achieve a specific goal, such as a policy change. Most hunger strikers will take liquids but not...

 and was released in a very ill condition. Her friends helped her go to Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

, but once her health was slightly better, she went back to Chechnya and began collecting evidence of crimes committed against civilian population of the republic, submitting it to United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...

 and international human rights organizations. In February 2003, Bitiyeva had been part of the group of women that demanded the opening of a mass grave
Mass grave
A mass grave is a grave containing multiple number of human corpses, which may or may not be identified prior to burial. There is no strict definition of the minimum number of bodies required to constitute a mass grave, although the United Nations defines a mass grave as a burial site which...

 site discovered near the settlement of Kapustino. She also worked with the Russian NGO Committee of Soldiers' Mothers
Union of the Committees of Soldiers' Mothers of Russia
The Union of the Committees of Soldiers' Mothers of Russia works to expose human rights violations within the Russian military.The organization was founded in 1989. Before 1998, it was known as the Committee of Soldiers' Mothers of Russia....

.

Death

On May 21, 2003, in the middle of a night, a group of over ten unidentified Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...

-speaking special forces troops (four of them masked) arrived in Kalinovskaya in two UAZ-452
UAZ-452
UAZ-452 UAZ-452 UAZ-452 («Bukhanka»("Loaf (of bread)"), "Tabletka"("Pill"), "Golovastik" ("Tadpole") is a family of unique off-road cars produced at the Ulyanovsk Automobile Plant.Serial production of the UAZ-452 started in 1965. The engine is from the GAZ-21....

 minivans. The troops broke into her family house and bound, gagged and hooded Zura and her son Idris, as well as her husband Ramzan and her brother Abubakar, and then shot them all four of them in the back of their heads (Zura was shot also in her hands). Only her other son, Eldard, escaped death by hiding in time. The killers also stole a videocassette recorder
Videocassette recorder
The videocassette recorder , is a type of electro-mechanical device that uses removable videocassettes that contain magnetic tape for recording analog audio and analog video from broadcast television so that the images and sound can be played back at a more convenient time...

 from the house. Later in the morning, two local men (Turpal Ismailov and Islambek Gadiyev) were also killed in their homes, presumably by the same group of attackers.

ECHR ruling

Bitiyeva had filed a complaint against Moscow with the European Court of Human Rights in 2000 for abuse while in detention (this was then-second ECHR case from Chechnya), but she has been murdered before the ruling was issued. On June 21, 2007, in the case of Bitiyeva and X v. Russia, the Court ruled that Russian forces were responsible for Bitiyeva's illegal detention, the inhuman and degrading treatment she suffered during detention, and for her subsequent "brutal" death. Russia was ordered by the court to pay €85,000 in damages to Bitiyeva's daughter, living as a refugee in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

.

External links

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