#WORLD #WORLDWIDE #GROZNY #Chechen #News #Journal #Update - "Fists bumping into my face and body"

 "Fists bumping into my face and body, and then, later, he tried to strangle me."*

"They made me spread my legs as wide as possible and then were beating me for a long time."**

This is what Isaev and Salekh told their lawyer when he finally managed to meet the two LGBT+ brothers in jail in Grozny, the Chechen capital, where they have been detained since February after being arrested by Russian police and forcibly returned to their homeland.

This horrible truth is emerging only now because they had been denied access to their lawyer until recently. Officials said they had fallen ill with COVID-19 and could not have visitors, even though they were being held in solitary confinement.

For the second time in their young lives, they have been detained and tortured by Chechen authorities. The first time was in April of 2020 when they were arrested for running a Telegram channel critical of Chechen President Raman Kadyrov. Our partners at the Russian LGBT Network helped them flee last year, but they've been captured and returned to these horrible conditions.

Now they are in severe and immediate danger of death.

More than 41,000 All Out members have already signed the petition calling on U.S. President Biden to demand that Russia release Salekh and Ismail immediately.

Now we need to increase international pressure before it's too late.

Help Isaev and Salekh by signing this petition TODAY.

– Yuri

*This is what Ismail Isaev told the Russian LGBT Network

** This is what Salekh Magamadov told the Russian LGBT Network

SOURCE:

●︎ Report: Brothers returned to Chechnya have been tortured – Washington Blade, 19 August 2021

Here is our original message:
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Friends,

When they called us, we heard screams in the background. And when our lawyer got to our safe house shortly after, he found it raided, with signs of a struggle, and the men were gone.

That's how we learned that Salekh Magamadov and Ismail Isayev, two young LGBT+ men we helped flee Chechnya, have been arrested by Russian police, and forcibly returned to their homeland.

We're incredibly worried about their wellbeing. Since 2017, more than 200 men have been arrested and tortured under suspicion of being gay or bisexual in the Russian Republic of Chechnya. At least six men were murdered.

They are only 20 and 17 years old and their lives are at risk.

The arrests happened on the same day that U.S. President Biden directed all U.S. diplomats around the world to do more to protect the human rights of LGBT+ people.

We need your urgent help: Sign this petition and call on President Biden to live up to his promise and demand that Russia release the men unharmed.

In spring last year, the two men were arrested and tortured by Chechen authorities for running an opposition Telegram channel and were later forced to record a video apology.

They were trying to get their lives back, but now they are back in hell. Our lawyers haven't been allowed to see them since the arrest. And we've learned only through Chechen media that they were being detained on a trumped-up suspicion of "aiding terrorism."

This is not the first time that people are brought back to Chechnya only to disappear or die. I genuinely fear for their lives.

 Join this call for their release now.

Thanks for going All Out.

Veronika Lapina,
Russian LGBT Network

SOURCES:

●︎ The ECHR ruled on the application of urgent measures on the detained Ismail Isaev and Salekh Magamadov, thereby confirming the risk of causing irreparable harm – Russian LGBT Network, 8 February 2021
● Chechnya opens terror inquiry into gay men forcibly returned from Moscow – The Guardian, 8 February 2021
● Gay Chechens returned to country by Russian authorities after fleeing torture, LGBT group says – Independent, 8 February 2021