Former prisoner tells how Dagestan citizen was tortured in Kirov colony

The convicted resident of Dagestan Sultan Umashev is tortured in a colony of the Kirov Region and forced to confess of committing terror acts under orders of Zakaev and Berezovskiy; this was reported by a former prisoner, who served his term in this colony up to the end of 2008.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that Russian human rights defenders had earlier stated that Chechen natives were tortured in Russian prisons.

According to the former prisoner of high security Corrective Colony No. 6, located in Vostochny settlement, Omutnin District of the Kirov Region, prisoner Umashev was regularly exposed to torture. When it became intolerable, Sultan tried to cut his left hand (up to the shoulder it is all in scars from cuts). It did not help, and then he thrust a sharp metal pintle into his breast. The pintle still remains not removed, although it happened last year.

The colony administration and special agents who tortured him offered him to hang up himself, as says the statement of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial"; in early May an employee of the Centre had a meeting with the former prisoner.

Letters from the colony come very seldom; inmates practically cannot make telephone calls. All the natives of the Caucasus convicted under the articles related to illegal armed formations and terrorism are exposed to beatings and torture, as told by the former prisoner.

The source of the employee of the HRC "Memorial" has also marked that this colony's personnel is formed up from militaries who took their service in Chechnya; this is a probable reason of their negative altitude to Chechens and other residents of Northern Caucasus.