Appellate court leaves Ingush activists, Nalgiev and Khautiev, in colony

The Stavropol Territorial Court has denied the defence's appeal against the refusal to mitigate the sentence and release Ingush activists, Ismail Nalgiev and Bagaudin Khautiev, from penal colony. The defence decided not to appeal against this decision.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that this February, Ismail Nalgiev, Bagaudin Khautiev and Barakh Chemurziev, who had already served most of their eight-year-long sentences, asked the court to replace the remaining part of their term with some punishment not related to imprisonment. In May, the court refused to satisfy the petitions.

These refusals can be appealed against, but the defence of Khautiev and Nalgiev does not plan to do so, as it considers it pointless. Both convicts are scheduled to be released in the spring of 2025.

There are no known cases of Ingush protesters being released under the conditional early relief (CER or parole) or having their sentences commuted to a more lenient one, Magomed Mutsolgov, an Ingush human rights defender and a public figure, has stated.

According to his story, eight protest leaders are still in jail – Akhmed Barakhoev, Malsag Uzhakhov, Musa Malsagov, Barakh Chemurziev, Bagaudin Khautiev, Ismail Nalgiev, Zarifa Sautieva and Akhmed Pogorov.

Magomed Mutsolgov has treated the fact that the activists were denied a mitigation of their sentences as outrageous. "The protest leaders were convicted illegally, we shouldn't forget this," he has stressed.