Zarema Musaeva has once again been denied conditional early release.
The Shali City Court of Chechnya has once again refused to satisfy the petition for the conditional early release of Zarema Musaeva, who has been imprisoned for about five years.
As reported by "Caucasian Knot", the court in Chechnya sentenced Musaeva to three years and 10 months in prison, finding her guilty of disrupting the work of the settlement colony. According to the investigation, in October 2024, Musaeva allegedly hit a Federal Penitentiary Service employee and tore off his epaulet while being transported from the hospital in a car. She categorically denied her guilt, calling it a pre-planned fabrication and revenge, but the Supreme Court of Chechnya upheld the sentence. The defense decided to seek her release through the mechanism of conditional early release, and on August 6, lawyer Alexander Savin submitted a petition for early release to the Shali City Court of Chechnya.
This is already the second sentence for Zarema Musaeva. Earlier, in July 2023, Musaeva was convicted in a criminal case of fraud and "using violence against a police officer." The Akhmatovsky District Court sentenced her to five and a half years in a colony, and the Supreme Court of Chechnya reduced the sentence to five years in a settlement colony. In March 2024, the Cassation Court in Pyatigorsk reduced Zarema Musaeva's sentence by three months – to four years and nine months, satisfying the prosecutor's request. The Shali City Court twice, in December 2023 and June 2024, refused to release Musaeva conditionally early.
The Shali City Court of Chechnya today again refused to conditionally early release Zarema Musaeva, reported the "Team Against Torture".
The court considered the petition for conditional early release in an off-site format at the settlement colony where Musaeva is held. The session began on September 17 and continued today.
Lawyer Alexander Savin insisted that Musaeva has the right to be released conditionally early. "This position of the defense corresponds to both the position of the Plenary Session of the Supreme Court and the position from practice," quotes the defender's words the Telegram channel of the organization.
Musaeva's lawyers plan to appeal the court's decision, indicates the project "Word to the Defense".
Human rights defenders reminded that Zarema Musaeva has been in custody for about five years. The woman suffers from severe insulin-dependent diabetes and needs constant treatment, medication, and special nutrition. During her imprisonment, her health condition has seriously deteriorated.
On June 17, Zarema Musaeva's daughter, Aliya Yangulbaeva, published an open letter on social media Instagram** addressed to Aishat Kadyrova, the eldest daughter of the head of Chechnya. In her address, Yangulbaeva asked Kadyrova to assist in freeing her mother, Zarema Musaeva. There has been no response to this appeal from Aishat Kadyrova or Ramzan Kadyrov. Analysts interviewed by "Caucasian Knot" doubted that Aishat Kadyrova could influence her father, Ramzan Kadyrov's position regarding the release of Zarema Musaeva. Aliya stated that the family and Zarema Musaeva herself hope for a prisoner exchange with the West.
Zarema Musaeva is the wife of former federal judge Said Yangulbaev. Chechen security forces took her away on January 20, 2022, from an apartment in Nizhny Novgorod. After that, Ramzan Kadyrov accused the Yangulbaev family of organizing a terrorist network and stated that they would find a place "in prison or underground." Details of the persecution of Musaeva are provided in the report of the "Caucasian Knot" "The Case of Zarema Musaeva".
Information about the conflict between Kadyrov and the Yangulbaevs can be read in the reports of the "Caucasian Knot" "How the Yangulbaevs Became Kadyrov's Enemies" and "Main Points on the Kadyrovites' Struggle Against the Yangulbaevs".
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