Hammerberg Is not Satisfied with the Work of Ministry of Internal Affairs and Vice Versa
October 8, 2010
Mari Otarashvili
South Ossetia de-facto government names 140 ethnic Ossetians to be missing. The representatives of South Ossetia de-facto President and a public defender, Davit Sanakoev state that this number includes not only those lost after the 2008 August war but all the lost people between 1989 and 2008.
“140 people have been deemed missing since 1989 and 7 since 2008,” – stated Sanakoev. According to him, the work on the issue of lost is taking course in three different formats, including – Geneva discussions. “Thomas Hammerberg, Council of Europe High Commissioner for Human Rights is directly involved in this work. International Committee of Red Cross is active.”
The inference by experts Bruce Peg and Nicola Sebiri invited by Thomas Hammerberg was published not too long ago. Except for different recommendations, they are asking Georgian government to conduct independent investigation on three lost Ossetian citizens.
These citizens are Alab Khachirova, Alan Khugaeva and Soltan Pliev, who, according to Tskhinvali information, were detained on October 13th, 2008, at the road situated between the villages Korkula and Khelchua. In the material presented by experts, it’s noted that in March of 2009, two video materials were located in internet that reflected three people – Alin Khachirov, Alan Khugaev and Soltan Pliev who were being interrogated using violent methods.
It’s noted in the recommendation that the people responsible for investigation and those who might be implicated in the issue should not be the officials of the same department. Shida Kartli police should be deprived of right to conduct the operational and investigative proceedings. Regional Prosecutor’s Office should be deprived of supervision of investigation and the investigation must check the acts of Georgian policemen, including the acts of police of special objective.
The head of Shida Kartli Regional Police, Vladimir Jugheli states that doesn’t have any information on lost ethnic Ossetians.
Shota Utiashvili, the head of informative-analytical department of Internal Ministry states in a conversation with us that Georgian side doesn’t agree with the part of expert’s inference of Council of Europe that talks about the irrelevant work of Georgian police: “Unfortunately, we can’t agree with the part of inference of Hammerberg commission that states that Georgian policemen might be involved in their disappearance. They don’t have any evidence for this. The investigation is continuing and we will bring this to end.”
Shota Utiashvili also expressed his open dissatisfaction on the work of Hammerberg Commission with “Ekho Caucasus” (echo Caucasus) (see the article: http://humanrights.ge/index.php?a=main&pid=12335&lang=geo ).
Lawyer Natia Katsitadze from GYLA (Georgian Young Lawyers Association), who works on this topic, states that currently Georgian side hold no more captives of August 2008 war.
Natia Katsitadze: “At this phase Georgian government doesn’t hold any Ossetian captives. The only captives are those with concrete charges. Nobody is detained under “illegal crossing of border,” or the similar charges. These kinds of captives were released through exchange as a result of negotiations. As for the captives before war, they are guilty serving the concrete sentences. As for the captives after the war, according to our information, they are all released by Georgian side. By the way, Ossetian side has approximately ten these kinds of prisoners.”
On the 61st session of UN General Assembly held in 2006, the international conventions for protection of all the lost. It prohibits the secret prisons and obliges the law-enforcement structures to provide information to the families and relatives of lost. The convention emphasizes that the forceful disappearance in certain environment is evaluated as the crime against person. In this case it falls in the jurisdiction of international law.
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