CAT/C/RUS/CO/5 The Committee is further concerned by recent amendments to the Criminal Code which expanded the definition of the crime of State treason to include “providing financial, technical, advisory or other assistance to a foreign state or international organization […] directed at harming Russia's security”. The Committee is concerned that such provision could affect persons providing information to the Committee against Torture, the SubCommittee on Prevention of Torture or the United Nations Voluntary Fund for Victims of Torture, which the Committee is concerned could be interpreted as prohibiting the sharing of information on the human rights situation in the Russian Federation with the Committee or other United Nations human rights organs. The Committee is deeply concerned by numerous and consistent reports of serious acts of intimidation, reprisals and threats against human rights defenders and journalists, including deaths, and the failure of the State party’s authorities to effectively investigate such acts and hold accountable the perpetrators, including those responsible for ordering them. The Committee expresses its concern that, to date, no one has been convicted of ordering the killings of journalist Ms. Anna Politkovskaya, in 2006, and human rights advocate Ms. Natalia Estemirova, in 2009, and that no one has been held accountable for the alleged beating of Ms. Sapiyat Magomedova by police in Dagestan in 2009 (arts. 2, 11, 13 and 16). The Committee recommends that the State party should: (a) Recognize that human rights defenders are at risk and have been targeted due to the performance of their human rights activities, which play an important role in a democratic society; amend its legislation requiring human rights organizations that receive foreign funding to register as “foreign agents”; repeal the amended definition of the crime of treason in the Criminal Code; and review its practice and legislation. The State party should ensure that all human rights defenders are able to conduct their work and activities in line with the provisions of the Declaration on the Right and Responsibility of Individuals, Groups and Organs of Society to Promote and Protect Universally Recognized Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (General Assemblyresolution 53/144); (b) Ensure that no individual or group will be subjected to prosecution for communicating with, or for providing information to, the Committee against Torture, the Sub-Committee on Prevention of Torture or the United Nations Voluntary Fund for Victims of Torture or to other United Nations human rights organs in performing their respective mandates; (c) Investigate promptly, thoroughly and impartially all allegations of intimidation, threats, attacks and killings of human rights defenders and bring to justice those responsible for ordering the killings of Ms. Anna Politkovskaya and Ms. Natalia Estemirova and the beating of Ms. Sapiyat Magomedova; Northern Caucasus 13. The Committee is concerned at numerous, ongoing and consistent reports of serious human rights abuses inflicted by or at the instigation or with the consent or acquiescence of public officials or other persons acting in official capacities in the northern Caucasus, including the Chechen Republic, including torture and ill-treatment, abductions, enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings. It is further concerned at the State party’s failure to investigate and punish the perpetrators of such abuses, despite the establishment of Agency No. 2 of the Chechen Republic investigation department for particularly important cases. It is particularly concerned by information provided by the State party that of 427 complaints of disappearances in the Chechen Republic received by the State party between 2007 and 2009, not a single case was brought to court. The Committee notes with alarm comments made by an official of the State party in March 2011 to the effect that neither the Prosecutor’s Office nor the Investigative Committee are able to compel the Chechen authorities to meaningfully investigate allegations of disappearances and other abuses, with 6