All news

Chechnya's leader mocks blacklisting by US joking that he 'will have a sleepless night'

Ramzan Kadyrov added that "great Americans who are known all over the world" come to the Chechen Republic regularly
Chechen head Ramzan Kadyrov Zubair Bairakov/TASS
Chechen head Ramzan Kadyrov
© Zubair Bairakov/TASS

MOSCOW, December 21. /TASS/. Head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, has commented on Washington’s decision to put him on the so-called Magnitsky List by saying he would not go to the US "for all the gold reserves in the country."

The US Department of the Treasury said earlier Kadyrov, whom Washington accuses of extra-judiciary killings, torture and other allegedly flagrant violations of internationally recognized human rights had been placed on the Magnitsky List of individuals whose entry to the US was prohibited.

"I’ll have a sleepless night ahead, and tranquilizers won’t help," Kadyrov recalled on Instagram. "I said it before, and I’ll say it again for those with short memory. I wouldn’t go to the US even if I were promised all the gold and foreign exchange reserves in the country."

"Great Americans who are known all over the world visit me regularly as guests and some of them are even thinking about permanent residence here," Kadyrov pointed out. "They don’t give a damn about all those sanctions."

"It is said that these sanctions are linked to human rights in one way or another but what’s the reason for targeting people on the other side of the planet for this when they are found in the White House and the Pentagon?" he said.

"The fact is the US can’t forgive me because I devoted my life to struggling with international terrorists, whose ranks included people fostered by US secret services," Kadyrov noted.