News

The sentence to the protesters, who took part in the "Million Mask March", should be abolished, because their guilt was not proved, the convicts' advocates declared to the Court of Appeal (CoA). The convicts have also demanded acquittal and stressed the political character of their case.

In Dagestan, on January 1, the printing of one of the republic's – the "Nastoyaschee Vremya" (Present Time) – was suspended. Not earlier than March, the weekly will start its electronic version. The reorganization will lead to dismissal of four out of six full-time employees, said the editor-in-chief Milrad Fatullaev.

The Russian soldier Valery Permyakov, accused of killing the Avetisyan family in Gyumri, must face the Armenian justice, rights defenders of Armenia believe. However, they doubt that the Russian party will give him out to Armenia.

Sultan Karasov was kidnapped in Stavropol, his relatives assert. They cannot find him for 8 days and do not rule out that he could be detained by power agents.

Aybike Saygidalieva, a resident of the Dagestan village of Shamkhal, the widow of Magomedarip Magomedov, who was killed in August 2014, whose disappearance was reported by local rights defenders, has returned home after interrogation at the Kizilyurt Inter-District Investigating Division of the Investigating Department for Dagestan of the Investigating Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF).

The Committee against Torture (CaT), which includes the rights defenders working in Chechnya in the Joint Mobile Group (JMG), has been put on the register of non-profit organizations (NPOs, treated as "foreign agents", said the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) of Russia.

Members of seven parties of South Ossetia have appealed to the political council under the Republic's President demanding to publish the draft treaty on South-Ossetian-Russian alliance and integration. The ruling party has treated the demand as a PR-move, stating that the political council had decided that the final version of the treaty will be published.

The murder of six family members in Gyumri, committed by a suspected Russian soldier Valery Permyakov, occurred in the territory of Armenia and should be investigated by law-enforcement bodies of this country.

Appeal complaints against the verdict in the case about the attack on Nalchik were submitted by 53 out of 57 convicts, including all five of them, sentenced to life imprisonment.

Diana Ramazanova, who committed, according to law enforcement bodies of Turkey, a terror act in Istanbul, was the wife of a native of Chechnya Abu Edelbiev, who was killed in Syria, and was a member, together with him, of the extremist organization "Islamic State" (IS), said a source from the Turkish intelligence service.

After the action of protest in Gyumri, Armenia, and the brawl that broke out there, on January 15 and 16, in total, 28 persons turned for help to hospital, said Armen Isaakyan, the director of the medical centre in Gyumri.

Within the last 24 hours, Armenian armed forces have violated the ceasefire regime at the troops contact line in the Karabakh conflict zone for 51 times, said the Ministry of Defence (MoD) of Azerbaijan. In its turn, the Defence Army of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) has reported about 200 cases of ceasefire violation by the Azerbaijani party.

So far, the public unrest after the massacre in Gyumri is not political, Armenian political analysts believe. However, in their opinion, the incident may affect the Russian-Armenian relations.

Chechen authorities expect participation of half a million people on January 19 in a rally against publication of caricatures on Prophet Muhammad. Local residents are ready to attend the action.

Employees of the Baku office of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) have not yet met Arsen Bagdasaryan, an Armenian soldier, detained by the Azerbaijani party on the contact line.

The incident in the office of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial" in the Chechen city of Gudermes, where masked men threw eggs at the women-employees of the office, was the continuation of Ramzan Kadyrov's policy, aimed at destruction of any manifestations of criticism addressed to the republic's leadership.

Dozens of editions from the Russian segment of Internet have posted photos of the latest Charlie Hebdo issue with caricatures on Prophet Muhammad. The experts on Northern Caucasus questioned by the "Caucasian Knot" have noted the difference in understanding the freedom of speech by members of the Muslim community and by proponents of the Western culture.

Twelve people suffered in clashes of protesters with the police in the city of Gyumri, including nine civilians and three policemen. At least seven people were detained.

As reported by the Dagestani Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA), the special operation in the village of Novoselskoe, Khasavyurt District of Dagestan, is over, resulting in a murder of one militant. Locals report about the deaths of two alleged members of the armed underground.

Relatives of Diana Ramazanova, suspected of committing a terror act in Istanbul on January 6, have recognized her in a photo, said a law enforcement source.