venth applicant managed to go outside and followed the servicemen. She noticed APCs and a URAL lorry parked about 200 metres from the house. The servicemen wiped the blood from Lema Dikayev, loaded him into one of the APCs and drove away. The applicant returned home and let her relatives out.
28. In the afternoon of 6 July 2002 the servicemen returned to the Dikayevs' house and searched it. They did not produce any search warrant.
29. On 6 July 2002 the applicants and their relatives went to the ROVD to obtain information about Lema Dikayev. One of the police officers told them that he had seen Lema in the ROVD building sitting on the floor in the hallway with his arms tied behind his back and his mouth taped over with adhesive tape. The seventh applicant and Mr T.Sh. visited Mr M., the head of the ROVD, and told him that Lema Dikayev had been seen on the ROVD premises. The officer promised to help and invited the seventh applicant to make complaints to the prosecutor's office and the ROVD.
30. On the same date the seventh applicant contacted, both in person and in writing, the district prosecutor's office, the ROVD, the Urus-Martan district military commander's office (the district military commander's office) and the local administration, complaining that her brother had been abducted.
31. On the evening of 6 July 2002 the officers from the ROVD told the applicants that Lema Dikayev was not detained in the ROVD building.
32. On 8 July 2002 Russian servicemen again visited the Dikayevs, told them that they were searching for weapons and carried out another search. Then they threatened to set the house on fire. The seventh applicant ran to the head of the ROVD, Mr M., and asked him to help her. Mr M. contacted someone on a portable radio and ordered the servicemen not to set the house on fire. The servicemen obeyed. When they were leaving the house, one of the officers, who introduced himself as Georgiy, told the eighth applicant that the servicemen had acted under the orders of Mr G., the Urus-Martan district military commander.
33. On same date, 8 July 2002, an official of the local administration told the seventh applicant that her brother was being detained on the premises of the district military commander's office. After that the seventh applicant visited the military commander, Mr G., who confirmed that Lema Dikayev was detained in their office. Mr G. also told the applicant that her brother had been implicated in the murder of Mr Kh.T., an officer of a law-enforcement agency. The seventh applicant suggested that if that was the case then Lema Dikayev should have been committed to trial. Mr G. replied that it was useless to try Chechens.
34. On an unspecified date in August 2003 the seventh applicant visited the head of the ROVD, Mr M., who told her that if she was patient for at least a year her brother would return home. When the applicant asked Mr M. whether he had any information concerning Lema Dikayev's fate, he said that he risked being killed if he replied.
35. The applicants continued their search for Lema Dikayev and contacted the Federal Security Service ("the FSB"), prosecutors' offices at different levels, the Chechnya administration and the Russian President.
36. In support of their statements the applicants of Lema Dikayev's family submitted the following accounts: a statement by the ninth applicant dated 28 March 2003; two statements by the seventh applicant dated 29 March 2003 and 9 February 2004 and a hand-drawn map of the applicants' house.
2. Information submitted by the Government
37. The Government did not challenge most of the facts as presented by the applicants. According to their submission, "at about 2 a.m. on 6 July 2002 unidentified armed persons in camouflage uniforms and masks kidnapped from their houses situat
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