Zarema Musaeva, the jailed mother of three exiled Chechen human rights activists, is in “close to critical” condition, Crew Against Torture, a nonprofit organisation assisting victims of torture and human rights violations in Russia, reported on Wednesday.
Musaeva, who suffers from type 2 diabetes, has critically high blood sugar levels, her lawyer Alexander Savin told Crew Against Torture, adding that while doctors had increased her dosage of insulin, it hadn’t led to an improvement in her health.
Savin added that the medical unit of Chechnya’s prison service had sent a request for Musaeva to be hospitalised, but received no response. “Zarema has restricted her food intake in order to prevent a further increase in sugar levels and is awaiting hospitalisation,” he said.
Savin learned of Musaeva’s deteriorating health on Tuesday at a cancelled hearing of Chechnya’s Supreme Court, which was due to consider a petition for her parole.
Musaeva is the wife of former Supreme Court judge Saidi Yangulbaev, who left Russia in 2022 after threats from Chechen head Ramzan Kadyrov. Musaeva’s exiled sons, Abubakar, Ibragim and Baisangur Yangulbaev, are all known to be harsh Kadyrov critics.
Chechen security forces detained Musaeva in January 2022 at her apartment in the central Russian city of Nizhny Novgorod and forcibly returned her to the Chechen capital, Grozny. A Chechen court sentenced Musaeva to five years in prison in July 2023 on charges of fraud and attacking a police officer, charges Musaeva and her team have denied.
The European Court of Human Rights ruled in May that Russia had violated a number of articles of the Convention on Human Rights in relation to Musaeva and her family. The court decided that Musaeva had not been detained for any crime she is alleged to have committed, but to intimidate her and her loved ones.
Musaeva’s lawyers first asked the court to release her on health grounds in December, with concerns raised multiple times over her declining health.