No “criminal events” were found in the beating of Nikita Zhuravel

The office of the Commissioner for Human Rights in Russia, Tatiana Moskalkova, found no crime in the beating by the son of the head of Chechnya, Adam Kadyrov, of Nikita Zhuravel, who was arrested in connection with the burning of the Koran. The photo of the answering device was published by the “Dozhd” TV channel.

The letter states that an investigation into the beating of Zhuravel was carried out in September 2023 by police officers of the city of Grozny. Then they also refused to initiate a criminal case “due to the absence of a crime.” The supervising prosecutor recognized such a decision as “legal and justified.”

Earlier, the head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, said that “it would be good” if his son Adam killed Zhuravel.

In August 2023, Adam Kadyrov, who was then 15 years old, beat Nikita Zhuravel in the Grozny pre-trial detention center. At the end of September, his father published a video of the beating. The head of Chechnya once again stated that he considers his son’s concession correct. At the same time, according to him, he initially thought that his son would be held accountable for beating Zhuravel. “I tormented him that they opened a criminal case for the beating. They say, he will be in prison for six to eight years. He replied that he considers it an honor to be in prison,” Ramzan Kadyrov is quoted as saying by Chechnya Segodnya. It was officially announced that Adam Kadyrov will not be punished in any way, since he has not reached the age of accountability – 16 years.

• Nikita Zhuravel, a 19-year-old resident of Volgograd, a native of Ukraine, who is suspected of burning the Koran, was detained on May 21 last year. On the instructions of the head of the Investigative Committee of Russia, Alexander Bastrykin, Zhuravel’s case was transferred to Chechnya, explaining this step by “numerous appeals from residents of the Chechen Republic with a request to recognize them as victims.”
• At the trial, Zhuravel asked for forgiveness from the Muslims and declared that he found himself guilty of burning a book sacred to believers, but he had no motive for a gross violation of order. He added that the people with whom he agreed to burn the Koran were not found, and he allegedly did it for the sake of ten thousand rubles, which in the end he did not receive.