News

Religious figures of the Georgian Orthodox Church held a protest against the legalization of marijuana use, as well as the initiative to allow the cultivation of cannabis for the production of cosmetics and medicines.

Summing up the results of the elections held in Southern Russia on September 9; special operation in Dagestan; announcement of a resonant sentence to 14 residents of Chechnya; verdict of guilty to Vladimir Bessonov, a former member of the State Duma; resumption of the action "Do not kill" in Tbilisi, – see the review of these and other events in the Caucasus during the week of September 10-16, 2018, prepared by the "Caucasian Knot".

A call to hold a rally against the sentence to 14 residents of the Kurchaloi District did not lead to protests in Grozny. When young people in Chechnya loose the possibility to legally protest and protect themselves by legal means, they get radicalized, the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial" noted.

Zaza Saralidze, an initiator of the action "Do not Kill", has been on the sixth day of his hunger strike with the demand for resignation of the Georgian government. Today, he has fallen ill. The hunger-striker is taken to the hospital.

Student Aisa Khulaeva, who shot a video about ballot stuffing at the elections to the People's Khural, is in Moscow. She has already met Sergey Mironov, the leader of the "Spravedlivaya Rossiya" (Fair Russia) Party, the Party's Kalmyk branch reports.

At the parade dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the Baku liberation, the Azerbaijani leader has announced that the strong army is the main condition for the resolution of the Karabakh conflict and the army's power is growing. The President of Turkey, who also attended the parade, stated that his country would not restore relations with Armenia until the conflict was resolved.

In the period from September 9 to 15, the Azerbaijani armed forces made more than 2500 shots on the positions of the Defence Army, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) for Nagorno-Karabakh reported.

During a shootout which occurred in the Talgi village not far from the Karabudakhkent District, law enforcers eliminated a group of militants, the National Antiterrorist Committee (NAC) reported.

During almost a week after the arrest of lawyer Mikhail Benyash in Krasnodar, the legality for the law enforcers' actions had not been verified, reported advocate Alexei Avanesyan. The dispute, in which some lawyers accuse Mikhail Benyash of violating the lawyer's ethics by participation in the opposition movement, diverts attention from the fact that Mikhail Benyash has been beaten, notes advocate Alexander Popkov.

The Armenian armed forces 88 times violated the ceasefire in the conflict zone during a day, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) for Azerbaijan reports today.

In 2018, the counterterrorist operation (CTO) legal regime has been introduced in the territories of the Buynaksk and Karabudakhkent Districts of Dagestan for the first time. In those areas, the recent special operation was conducted last year. The CTO legal regime has been introduced for the eighth time this year in the territory of the republic.

Law enforcers are holding their special operations in the Buinaksk and Karabudakhkent Districts, which were today put under the counterterrorist operation (CTO) regime, the spokesman for the Operative Headquarters in Dagestan of the Russian National Antiterrorist Committee (NAC) gas stated.

The 14 residents of the Chechen Kurchaloi District, convicted within the resonant case, received long prison terms for participating in the armed underground, Judge Taus Getaev has stated.

Askandar Bilalov, a former acting head of the Makhachkala customs post, has turned to the Committee Against Torture (CAT) with a complaint about torture after his detention in August 2016, stating that over the past two years, fourteen resolutions were passed on his complaint, rights defenders report.

Chechen residents do not rule out that the call to go to the rally in Grozny could be a provocation staged by law enforcers. They believe that a very small number of people would respond to the call.

Makhmud Velitov, the Imam of the Moscow "Yardyam" Mosque, convicted for justifying terrorism, was kept at the Astrakhan City Hospital, chained to the bed; now, he is back at the prison hospital, where they fail to treat his heart problems, but tore off his nails because of fungus, Velitov's advocate has stated.

The Russian Embassy to Azerbaijan has refused to help in arranging a meeting with a Russian citizen Salekh Rustamov, who was arrested in Baku on charges of illegal sponsoring the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan (PFPA), his son has stated.

During the shootout in the Khasavyurt District of Dagestan, law enforcers and civilians did not suffer, the Russian National Antiterrorist Committee (NAC) has stated today.

The Investigating Committee is checking the today's video message of Aisa Khulaeva, who had disappeared after she recorded a ballot-stuffing one of the polling stations in Kalmykia.

Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh have held, and Azerbaijan has announced exercises that imitate a sharp aggravation of military confrontation in the region.