Day: July 15, 2009

Russia – Ingushetia: Russian human rights activist, Natalia Estemirova, found murdered — critic of Extremist Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov

BBC reports:
— “A prominent Russian human rights activist, Natalia Estemirova, has been found dead in the North Caucasus.”
— “She was bundled into a van and abducted as she left her home in Chechnya on Wednesday morning, a colleague said. Her body was found in Ingushetia.”

BBC also reports:
— “Award-winning Russian human rights campaigner Natalia Estemirova, who has been found shot dead in the North Caucasus, documented hundreds of cases of abuse in Chechnya.”
— “Her work for the Russian human rights group Memorial latterly focused on alleged human rights violations by government-backed militias.”

New York Times reports:
— “In recent years, Ms. Estemirova had focused on kidnappings that she believed were carried out under the authority of the Chechen president, Ramzan A. Kadyrov, who has enjoyed unwavering public support from the Kremlin.”
— “Her work met with threats and denunciations from Chechen authorities. In March of 2008, after Ms. Estemirova criticized a new law requiring women in Chechnya to wear head scarves, Mr. Kadyrov summoned her to a personal meeting and threatened her, an experience so frightening that she went abroad for several months, said Tatyana Kasatkina, deputy director of the Rissian human rights group Memorial, where Ms. Estemirova had worked since 1999. Friends tried to convince Ms. Estemirova to stay away, but she felt compelled to return.”

Free Internet Press reports:
— “Ms. Estemirova worked for years helping families uncover details about kidnapped relatives. She was the recipient of several international awards, and in 2007 was the first to win the Anna Politkovskaya Award, named for the Russian investigative journalist, who also worked to uncover abuses in Chechnya before she was shot to death in October 2006.”

— “Ms. Estemirova’s work often ran afoul of the Chechen government, led by the Kremlin-backed strongman Ramzan Kadyrov, whom human rights groups have accused of personally torturing kidnap victims.”

— Reuters: Group blames Chechen leader for activist’s murder

— Global Post: “Did Chechnya’s leader just kill this woman?”

March 1, 2009 – Russia: Chechen President defends extremist “honor killings” – says women deserve to die
— “Ramzan Kadyrov said the women, whose bodies were found dumped by the roadside, had ‘loose morals’ and were rightfully shot by male relatives in honor killings. ‘If a woman runs around and if a man runs around with her, both of them are killed,’ Kadyrov told journalists in the capital of this Russian republic.”

UK: White supremacist Neo-Nazi guilty of bomb plot – Neil Lewington — Ku Klux Klan, Combat 18 Nazi material found

(UK) White supremacist guilty of bomb plot – Neil Lewington
— Neo-Nazi convicted of terror plan
— “Man had turned parents’ home into bomb factory”
— “The search also found the Waffen SS UK members’ handbook, containing his blueprint for a neo-Nazi terror group, and notebooks with details of electronics and chemical mixtures and a book called Counter Bomb. His mobile phone contained hate material from a violent neo-Nazi group called Combat 18 and other material from the Ku Klux Klan was also found.”
— British white supremacist guilty of bomb plot

Pakistan: Jirga orders marrying off three minor girls

(Pakistan) Jirga orders marrying off three minor girls
— “Ghulam Sarwar and his wife Rahila Ghulam, residents of Tehsil Jhat Pat, district Jaffarabad, Balochistan”
— “I have three minor daughters Paras, 4, Sughra, 2, and Rehmat who is just eight months old and I will not marry my daughters to my paternal uncles, said Rahila while bitterly crying”

Canada: “Neo-Nazi hate, courtesy of the CHRC” – Canadian Human Rights Commission

Canada: “Neo-Nazi hate, courtesy of the CHRC” – Canadian Human Rights Commission
— National Post’s Ezra Levant reports: “In her July 11 letter to the National Post, Lynch denies that CHRC staff hacked into the Internet account of a private citizen to cover their tracks as they logged into their memberships in neo-Nazi websites. Lynch says both the Privacy Commissioner and the RCMP ‘found no evidence to support this allegation.'”
— Levant states: “But that’s not true. The Privacy Commissioner’s staff did not investigate the hacking — that is not within their jurisdiction.”
— Levant states: “In fact, CHRC employees have been active members of neo-Nazi organizations for years, and have published countless anti-Semitic, anti-gay and anti-black comments online. CHRC employees have admitted to this under oath. On the same day Monfette testified about the hacking, CHRC investigator Dean Steacy testified there were no guidelines about what CHRC staff could do using their online Nazi memberships.”
— Levant states: “Steacy, for example, used his Nazi membership to write encouraging words to a racist group called B. C. White Pride. He praised them, told them their racist posters were ‘great’ and promised to distribute their literature. Your tax dollars at work.”
— Levant states: “Other CHRC investigators went further. One praised Nazi leaders ( ‘I still say [Adrien] Arcand is our man!’); called for Canadian police to discriminate against blacks ( ‘exactly when will white cops understand that they should stand by THEIR race?!’); and trashed a Jewish youth group ( ‘if people spent the time building fellow WNs [White Nationalists] up rather than tearing them down we’d be dangerous. Unless your goal is to tear people down in which case go join Hillel or something.’)”