Gani Khalitov, a resident of Chechnya, accused his son Khasan Khalitov in a video message of slandering the republic’s leadership and said he wanted to kill the blogger who left for Turkey.
Khasan Khalitov has publicly refused to apologize to Ramzan Kadyrov for his criticism, reports Kavkazsky Uzel*.
«Hasan, don’t sit there [in Turkey], don’t engage in idle talk, for the sake of the Almighty <… > . You’re slandering the republic and us — you and your kind. I didn’t raise you to go off and have these kinds of conversations, but to have you as a helper in my old age. What did you make of it? You became my enemy by leaving and settling there. You went against me. You don’t listen to me, you don’t listen to anybody. Don’t have these conversations: that we were taken, that we were locked up, that there was violence. I swear there was no violence. < … > Tell your friends not to talk about your father, not to talk about your brother, not to talk about your sister. Don’t talk about it, please. You say things you don’t know,» Ghani Khalitov said.
The blogger’s father threatened to kill his son. «I don’t know, if I had the chance to get there — I might kill you to stop you, since you won’t stop. «Stop! Why are you saying that? Or is someone forcing you to say it, telling you we’ll kill you if you don’t talk? No one’s making us say it. You weren’t raised to walk around like that. I provided for you. Once you went there, you disappeared, you changed,» he says.
A few days ago Khasan Khalitov recorded an audio message to the head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov. In it he calls him a «rogue», «the main shaitan of the Caucasus», and also suggests that he go to the Kremlin, «to sweep and live in Putin’s kitchen».
Relatives of opposition members in Chechnya are constantly subjected to pressure from the authorities who demand that they condemn anti-Kadyrov and anti-government statements. Many of them face death threats, and opposition bloggers themselves are regularly assassinated, even if they live in third countries, such as the EU, Radio Liberty* reports.
In September, blogger Khasan Khalitov, who lives in Turkey, accused Chechen law enforcers of abducting his relatives in Chechnya. According to him, the abductees were released after a few days. Khalitov also claimed that Chechen authorities were behind the announcement of a vendetta against him and several families in the republic. He called on the head of Chechnya to send a representative to Turkey to «sort it out». In October, Kadyrov visited Turkey with his aide, press minister Akhmed Dudayev. He said that they had «walked up and down through several Turkish cities» but had never met anyone who claimed to be ready for a meeting with the head of Chechnya. Khalitov reproached Kadyrov’s associates for cowardice, saying they deliberately avoided meeting with him. In response, Dudayev published a video message from his brother, Khasan Khalitov, in which he harshly condemns his relative for criticizing the republic’s leadership. No Chechen official would engage in a dialogue with the blogger, Khalitov’s brother said, promising to rip out his tongue.
Earlier the blogger had recorded a video appeal to Kadyrov in which he criticized the leadership of Chechnya over the border issue with Ingushetia, accusing them of fomenting ethnic hatred. Khalitov’s video appeared immediately after Sirazhudin Sultygov’s appeal to Kadyrov.
* The Russian Ministry of Justice has included the publications in the list of foreign agents media.
