Illness and involvement with political assassinations: Russia releases investigation on Chechen leader Kadyrov

Russian investigators have reported that Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov's circle of associates may be involved in high-profile political assassinations, and that Kadyrov himself is preparing his successors due to illness.

Source: investigation by the Russian media outlet Proekt

Details: The media outlet recalls that the Kadyrov family came to power in Chechnya in 1999. At that time, Akhmat Kadyrov, who had previously declared war on Russia, agreed to take up the post of head of Chechnya's administration.

The investigators write that in exchange for loyalty to the Kremlin, the Russian authorities offered candidates for the head of Chechnya five million dollars in cash, a house in Sochi, and permission to "hand over" a large Russian city, such as Novorossiysk.

Akhmat Kadyrov then received not only all of Chechnya as a gift from Putin, but also a prayer rug, which he was particularly proud of, a family friend said.

Ramzan Kadyrov, Akhmat Kadyrov's youngest and favourite son, has been serving as  commander of an armed detachment under his father since 2000, helping the FSB (Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation) search for separatist supporters in Chechnya.

Akhmat Kadyrov, who had begun to have disagreements with the Kremlin, was killed in an explosion during a parade at the Dynamo Stadium in Grozny on 9 May 2004. The bomb was planted right under the seat that Kadyrov senior was sitting in.

Ramzan Kadyrov was not with his father that day, but in Moscow. Putin immediately welcomed him and made it clear that he would be the next head of Chechnya.

As a result, the media outlet writes, "Under Kadyrov, Chechnya has effectively withdrawn from the Russian legal framework, becoming a unique region with its own army and its own essentially Sharia law, where, unlike the rest of the country, the death penalty is actually in force, where colossal sums of money are stolen and no one is punished for it".

Proekt believes that the Chechen leader's circle may be involved in many high-profile political murders. In particular, there is a Chechen mark in the murders of politician Boris Nemtsov, former Chechen deputy prime minister Yakov Sergunin, Forbes magazine editor-in-chief Paul Khlebnikov, Novaya Gazeta journalist Anna Politkovskaya, and Natalia Estemirova, a member of the Memorial Human Rights Centre.

Regarding Kadyrov's illness, which has been repeatedly reported by the media, the newspaper, citing sources, writes that Kadyrov did have kidney problems which had been cured, at least for a while. He began to prepare his successors – he put members of his family in almost the entire vertical of Chechen power.

Officially, Ramzan Kadyrov has one wife, Medni Kadyrova, who gave birth to 14 children by the age of 42. In fact, the investigation claims, the head of Chechnya has a harem of concubines (not always adults) and his children were born by at least four women.

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