ICRF: lawyer who represented North-Ossetian residents at ECtHR accused of fraud

Law enforcers have detained Taisia Baskaeva, a lawyer of the Moscow Regional Bar, accused of 42 fraud episodes, said the press service of the Investigating Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF). However, Dmitry Efremov, a lawyer, who is representing Baskaeva's interests, believes that the investigators' claims are groundless.

According to the ICRF, on February 19, 2013, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) made a decision on the suit 42 former and current employees of the Russia's Ministry for Emergencies (MfE) for the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania and awarded a sum of money in excess of 26.5 million roubles for their service in the emergency conflict zone in the territory of the republic. The claimants' interests at the ECtHR were represented by Taisia Baskaeva.

According to investigators, Baskaeva organized a transfer by deception of the above money to her personal bank account and then disappeared and was put on the international wanted list.

Earlier, Baskaeva and her defender Dmitri Efremov stated association of the criminal case with her work in defence of citizens' interests at Russian courts and at the ECtHR.

Taisia Baskaeva was representing the interests of employees of the State Fire-Fighting Service of the MIA of Ossetia (in 2004, the Service was included into the MfE, – note of the "Caucasian Knot"), who worked in the Ossetian-Ingush conflict are and were not paid, according to the fire-fighters, their due bonuses.