News

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) is waiting explanations from Georgian authorities on the complaint submitted by the family of Temirlan Machalikashvili, who perished during a special operation conducted in Pankisi, said Tamta Mikeladze, the head of the "Centre for Human Rights Training and Monitoring".

At the initiative of the Ingush branch of the Russian FSB, a court in Moscow has fined the "International Memorial" by 300,000 roubles. In total, the court has considered 22 protocols drawn up against "Memorial" structures leaders thereof for the absence of the marking "foreign agent" in their publications.

The Chechen Ministry of Tourism has issued a memo on how to dress in the republic and communicate with local women.

Shelters for victims of domestic violence in the republics of Northern Caucasus help women who suffered from ill-treatment by their husbands or became pregnant without being married, as well as mothers with children, employees of crisis centres report. In Dagestan, about half of female victims of domestic violence return to their husbands, the human rights defenders report.

Djambulat Umarov, Chechen Minister of National Policy, recorded a video message in response to negative reviews in connection with being awarded with the "Glory and Honour" Third Degree Order of the Russian Orthodox Church. Social network users and residents of the republic found that the Djambulat Umarov's award from the Russian Orthodox Church contradicted the concepts of Islam.

Shamkhan Khamurzaev, who disappeared in Grozny, returned home, his mother reported. The woman retracted an earlier statement that her son was found in a law enforcement unit. Human rights defender Oleg Orlov doubts the new version voiced by the woman from Grozny.

The ceasefire in the Karabakh conflict zone and on the border with Armenia was violated 22 times, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) of Azerbaijan reported.

The public criticism of religious views of Sufism followers in Chechnya, expressed by the blogger, Tumso Abdurakhmanov, is inappropriate, said Akhmet Yarlykapov, an Islamic scholar. In his turn, Ruslan Kutaev, the President of the Assembly of Caucasian Nations, believes that the polemic on religious topics will not cause significant damage to the blogger, but some people will get disappointed in him.

The scandal around the towers destroyed by vandals has triggered violent Internet discussions among residents of Chechnya and Ingushetia, whose relations had been strained after changing their mutual borders, an expert on the Caucasus has noted.

Magomed Ozdoev, a participant in the March rally in Magas, has stated that he had attacked three employees of the "Rosgvardia" (Russian National Guard) not because of his political convictions, but in response to beating him up with a truncheon.

Raul Khadjimba, the President of Abkhazia, has refused to voluntarily leave his post; but he is ready to meet representatives of the bloc of oppositional forces and hold talks, Dmitry Dbar, an MP of the People's Assembly. Aslan Bzhaniya has already arrived in Sukhumi.

The killing of the Azerbaijani border guard will not be an occasion to exacerbate the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict, analysts have predicted.

The President of Abkhazia, Raul Khadjimba, must step down so that the protests in the country do not lead to tragic consequences, the "Aitaira" Party has stated amid the storming of the building of the presidential administration.

A court in Moscow has ruled on 21 out of 28 protocols, drawn up against the structures of the "Memorial" and their leaders, on the initiative, in particular, of the Ingush branch of the FSB (Russian Federal Security Bureau). The amount of fines imposed on human rights defenders for the absence of the marking of "foreign agent" in their publications has reached 4.2 million roubles.

The act of blogger, Mukhamed Nosaev, who threw banknotes into a crowd of Volgograd residents, fails to meet the Chechen decency rules, residents of the republic pointed out.

For the period of investigation, a court in Poland has released Dashgyn Agalarov, an Azerbaijani activist, who has called the charges against him far-fetched and politically motivated, from custody. Fikret Guseinli, a "Turan" TV presenter, has noted the help of international human rights defenders in Agalarov's case.

Relatives of Archpriest, Giorgi Mamaladze, have threatened to publicize the facts discrediting the Georgian Church, should they refuse to pardon the priest. The theologians interviewed by the "Caucasian Knot" express doubts that the Patriarchy was interested in Mamaladze's imprisonment, but indicated that his case inflicted a serious blow to the image of the church.

The Prosecutor's Office (PO) of Saint Petersburg has conducted a series of checks of the "Matilda" movie by the film director, Alexei Uchitel, which in 2017 was opposed by authorities of the republics of Northern Caucasus, and found no violations of the law.

On January 8, after meeting the Georgian Ombudsperson, the convicted Archpriest Giorgi Mamaladze agreed to stop his hunger strike and started eating. His advocate treats his health condition as critical.

Lasha Chkhartishvili, an activist of the Labour Party, has been fined by 3000 laries (GEL) for resisting the police during his arrest on January 3, 2020. The activist himself treats ruling as politically motivated, noting that oppositionists had never been so largely fined under this article before.