Chechen dictator Ramzan Kadyrov has received international condemnation for alleged human rights violations including murder, torture, and corruption, but his latest misadventure occurred on Russian national television. Kadyrov entered his Akhmad, Eli, and Adam in MMA bouts; Akhmad is ten years old, Eli in nine, and Adam is eight.
They all won!
Fedor Emelianenko was not impressed.
Needless to say that kids under age of 12 cannot even attend MMA fights [in Russia] as spectators, but here we had little ones as young as eight beating each other up in front of happy adults, posted Fedor, who is the head of the MMA Union, the governing body of Russian MMA.
Supporters of Kadyrov defended him, with one, Chechen politician Adam Delimkhanov, threatening that Fedor “will have to answer for every word.” Delimkhanov is wanted by Dubai in connection with the murder of Chechen warlord Sulim Yamadayev.
Kadyrov then requested that his followers stop their criticism of Fedor.
Days later Fedor’s 16-year-old daughter was attacked by unknown assailants. A kick reportedly left “a contusion of the chest and abdomen” that was treated at the Research Institute of Children’s Emergency Surgery and Traumatology, according to the Russian language MK.ru, as translated by Karim Zidan for BE.
On October 13, Pavel Milovanov, the Head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Administration for Inquiry in Moscow, said police had partially identified the assailant using surveillance tapes, according to KP.ru, as translated by BE. Emelianenko’s daughter testified that the attacker had “Slavic features.”
There was widespread speculation – with no proof – that Kadyrov was behind the attack. Now the dictator has issued a strong denial, via the official government website chechnya.gov.ru. Once again, translation is via Zidan for BE.
This is an outrageous incident that needs to be investigated thoroughly and those responsible be punished to the fullest extent of the law. And the judge should not only consider the beating, but also the provocative actions clearly aimed to incite ethnic hatred.
Hard to believe that the aim was only to put a beating, causing physical pain before robbery. With high probability, we can say that the task was to cause a public outcry.
The perpetrator must be found at any cost. In Moscow, surveillance cameras scan every square meter. [The attacker] can and should be sought out. We are also working towards this and are ready to provide maximum assistance.
People who pose a threat to children must be isolated and not roam the streets leading to schools.
To put the episode in geopolitical context, Russia, a historically Christian nation, engaged in two disastrous wars with separatists from predominantly Muslim Chechnya, which remained a Russian republic after the dissolution of the USSR. In 2007, Russian president Vladimir Putin installed Kadyrov, who had been one of several warlords in the region, as the leader of Chechnya. The two do not see eye to eye on every issue, but the differences are not sufficient to start a third war over, and Kadyrov is vocal and public of his support for the Russian leader.
The USSR long used sport for political ends, and that endures. Fedor enjoys a high-profile friendship with Putin, and it is different than for example a friendship between a US president and a Tennis player. In Russia, sports are not just entertainment, they have political ends. That is why members of Russia’s intelligence services participated in the doping scandal that kept the entire Track team out of the last Olympics. So an attack on Fedor is an attack on some part of the state.
Whoever did it had better be running. They have bigger problems by far than a Ground and Pound, even Fedor’s.
