Armed and masked attackers beat a prominent Russian journalist and a lawyer in Chechnya on Tuesday, rights groups reported.

The assault targeted reporter Elena Milashina and Alexander Nemov, a lawyer with the human rights group, Crew Against Torture.

Milashina works for top independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta,  which lost its license in Russia.

She has focused on rights abuses in Chechnya and has received death threats in the past.

What happened in the attack?

The pair were traveling to the Chechen capital Grozny when several cars blocked their vehicle as it left the airport. Masked assailants physically attacked them and broke their equipment. Both were subsequently hospitalized in Grozny, and later taken to Beslan.

A spokesperson for Crew Against Torture told DW that Milashina and Nemov were "beaten and very seriously injured."

"Elena Milashina's head was shaved and covered in green dye. She was kicked in the face and slips in and out of consciousness," Natalia Kurekina told DW. "Several fingers are broken on both hands."

Nemov, meanwhile, received a deep cut to his leg. "He finds it hard to walk, but is improving. But Elena Milashina is in a very bad way," she added.

Crew Against Torture shared photos of Milashina in a hospital with her hands in bandages.

A subsequent tweet showed the Human Rights ombudsman of Chechenya at the hospital and talking to Milashina and Nemov. 

What rights groups said about the attack on Elena Milashina

The Memorial rights group said in a statement on social media that the pair "received death threats and were threatened with a gun to the head. Their equipment was taken away and smashed."

The statement said that while being beaten, they were told: "You have been warned. Get out of here and don't write anything".

Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders condemned "the savage attack" on the Russian journalist.

Independent journalists targeted in Russia

Milashina and Nemov were in Chechnya to cover the sentencing by a court of a Chechen woman charged with assaulting a policeman.

The defendant, Zarema Musayeva, is the mother of two local activists who have challenged Chechen authorities.

Elena Milashina has worked for years exposing human rights abuses in Chechnya, drawing anger in the region ruled by strongman leader Ramzan Kadyrov — a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Milashina was the target of a similar attack at a hotel in Grozny in 2020. She is not the only Novaya Gazeta journalist to face threats and attacks.

Six journalists working for the newspaper — whose founder Dmitry Muratov won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021 — have been killed since 2000. Anna Politkovskaya, a fierce critic of the Kremlin's policies in Chechnya, was shot dead in 2006.

DW's Alexandra Ivanova contributed to this report.

dvv/ab (AFP, Reuters)