From: MSN NicknameEagle_wng (Original Message) Sent: 2/21/2006 4:53 PM
15.2.2006 13:12 MSK
Dmitriyevsky appeals sentence of Soviet court
RUSSIA, Nizhniy Novgorod. Executive Director of the Society of Russian-Chechen Friendship (ORCHD) and Editor-in-Chief of the newspaper "Human Rights", Stanislav Dmitriyevsky entered a writ of appeal on February 13th, to the Judicial Board for Criminal Cases of the Nizhniy-Novgorod Provincial Court with regard to the sentence imposed by the Soviet district court of Nizhniy Novgorod.
On the same day, a writ of appeal was submitted to the provincial court by Dmitriyevsky’s attorney, Leyla Khamzayeva, who lives in Moscow. On February 9th, Yuri Sidorov, another defense attorney, submitted an appeal. The appeals contain demands to revoke his sentence, and to close the criminal case.
Information Center ORCHD, reports that, in their complaints, Dmitriyevsky’s lawyers focus on the groundlessness of sentence. Dmitriyevsky, in his complaint, puts special emphasis on the incompetence of expert-linguist Teslenko, who arrived at inaccurate conclusions about racial, national, and social hostility in the article Dmitriyevsky published.
Last week the procuratorship also put in an appeal to the provincial law court to stiffen Dmitriyevsky’s punishment.
On February 3rd, the Soviet District Court of Nizhniy Novgorod found Dmitriyevsky guilty of actions, "directed toward the excitation of hostility, and also toward the humiliation of a group of persons based on race, nationality or social group", and was sentenced to two years conditional deprivation of freedom four years probation. Dmitriyevsky was found to be guilty as a result of publishing the appeals of Ahmet Zakaev and Aslan Maskadov to the Russian people and the European Parliament, that contained calls for peace, harsh criticism of Russian policy in the North Caucasus and of Vladimir Putin. Russian and international human rights organizations believe the charge to be politically motivated, and the sentence handed down by the court to be illegal and directed toward the liquidation of guarantees of freedom of speech in Russia.
Translated by OM Kenney
PRIMA-News Agency [2006-02-13-Rus-36]
http://www.prima-news.ru/eng/news/news/2006/2/15/34904.html
