Photo: Ms. Raisa Kosumova from Chechnya killed during a mortar attack by the federal troops.

    The European Court of Human Rights will examine the circumstances of death of 35 year old Raisa Kosumova under the mortar fire.

    Today specialists of the Committee against Torture have sent another application to the European Court, the applications concerns the death of Raisa Kosumova from Chechnya who was killed in 2003 as a result of shelling. The application is filed on behalf of the victim’s mother.

The public investigation conducted by the Committee against Torture has revealed that articles 2 and 13 of the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms were violated in respect of Raisa Kosumova.

The circumstances of the case are as follows. On 7 June 2003 on the road Dyshnevo-Vedeno-Kharachoy (Chechnya) a police car exploded. Several police officers were wounded, two died on the spot. After that bombing the police summoned additional forces and shelled the forest area- where the militants were allegedly hiding- from the village of Dyshnevo-Vedeno. However, the mortar attack appeared to be inaccurate and the shells fell almost in the location of the explosion and injured two security service officers. At the same time Raisa Kosumova was driving home to Kharachoy from the village of Vedeno and also came under fires.

Upon the fact of Kosumova’s death the regional prosecutor’s office promptly instigated criminal proceedings. However, the investigation was many times suspended and terminated. The perpetrators have not been determined. For almost 6 years now, Raisa’s mother, Ruman, has been trying to study the results of the prosecutor’s office check, but in vain.

The official investigation has not found out who was in charge of the cordon, why Kosumova was allowed to drive through the area under mortar fire, who ordered that shelling without any precise calculation of the target location and what was done in order to assess and prevent possible damage to civilians.