Chechen surgeon beaten to death after surgery fails to save Kadyrov relative

In Chechnya, a Russian republic in the North Caucasus, a surgeon was kidnapped and beaten to death after an unsuccessful operation that resulted in the patient’s death. The deceased patient turned out to be a relative of one of the associates of the head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov.

The incident on September 22 in Chechnya was reported by the anonymous but trusted Telegram channel 1adat in Chechnya. During the operation, which was carried out by one of the leading surgeons of the republic, Salakh Dagayev, an elderly woman, a resident of the Gudermes district, the sister of one of the closest associates of the head of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov, died.

On the same day, immediately after the operation, unknown masked men kidnapped the surgeon and took him away in an unknown direction.

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The author of the Telegram channel reported that Salakh Dagayev was kidnapped and beaten to death by a relative of the deceased woman. On September 23, the surgeon’s body was handed over to his relatives and they were threatened with punishment if the incident was made public. Relatives were forced to say that Dagayev died of a heart attack.

Salakh Dagayev was buried on September 24 in the village of Goity. A resident of this village named Zaurbek spoke with the Caucasian Knot about the doctor’s funeral.

“Salakh lived in Grozny. Well, his whole family lives there. And here, in Goyty, is their ancestral cemetery. The body was brought here, to his father’s house, where his brother lives. Here they washed him, prepared for burial, as it should be according to our customs. From these people, the villagers say, we found out that Salakh’s whole body was destroyed. And his face was like a black spot,” Zaurbek said.

According to him, for three days the stream of those who came to express condolences to the relatives and friends of the deceased did not stop:
“While offering condolences, people did not ask why he passed away. Usually, they ask about the cause of death: how long the deceased had been sick, what happened and how. But here everyone knew what he died from, no one had any doubts.”

Malika worked as an operating nurse in a republican hospital, she knew Salakh Dagayev well.

She doubts that Salakh died suddenly of a heart attack. “People name a different cause of his death,” the woman said, but she herself was afraid to name the cause of death.

Hussein, a surgeon at one of the district hospitals, said that now, if a seriously ill patient is brought on your duty, you should first find out who his family is, whether there are any VIPs or the head’s close associates, in order to know the consequences of an undesirable outcome of the surgery.

“Dagayev Salakh, a doctor with forty years of experience, PhD, was killed by Kadyrov’s closest associate. He was tortured and killed. All the doctor’s fault was that a seriously ill sister of one of Kadyrov’s associates died on the operating table. Couldn’t save – die yourself,” wrote Twitter user Djokhar Dudaev.