News

According to preliminary data on the results of a special operation in the settlement of Ekazhevo, Nazran district of Ingushetia, three supposed gunmen were killed. None of the members of power ministries got injured, the Ministry of Interior Affairs of the republic reported.

According to Georgian human rights defenders, the report of the international human rights organization "Human Rights Watch" (HRW) entitled "World report 2012: Georgia" was supposed to reflect the case of murder of Sandro Girgvliani and evaluate the actions of the prosecutor's office and position in the judicial system.

Department of Natural Resources and State Ecological Control of the Krasnodar Territory has announced a contest to prepare the materials for the closure of the state natural reserve "Bolshoy Utrish". Ecologists are concerned about plans to close the natural reserve, and they believe that the authorities intend to deprive of the protection status the most valuable parts of the Mediterranean forests, located on the Black Sea coast between the cities of Anapa and Novorossiysk.

Azerbaijan occupies the 162nd place in the "Press Freedom Index of 2011-2012" of the international organization in defence of the media "Reporters Without Borders" (RWB). The traditional RWB's report on the "Press Freedom Index" was released on January 25.

A man was killed in the attack of unidentified persons on people in secondary school in Nalchik.

The Chechen Republic' leader Ramzan Kadyrov will not challenge the decision of the Khamovniki Court of Moscow to close the criminal case against Oleg Orlov, the head of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial". This was told to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent by Andrei Krasnenkov, the Kadyrov's lawyer.

After checking publications in the media, the Prosecutor's Office of Dagestan has not found evidence of involvement of law enforcement agents of the republic in kidnapping.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed a decree on additional guarantees and compensations to investigatory officers, who work in Northern Caucasus. He announced that during today's meeting with Alexander Bastrykin, the head of the Investigatory Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF).

On January 24, the parents of Sharvili Ramazanov, a teenager from Dagestan, who had earlier reported that their son was beaten by policemen, received a statement on refusal to initiate a criminal case against policemen of the Magaramkent ROVD (District Interior Division). The parents plan to appeal against this decision in court.

Today, the Sumgait City Court, chaired by Judge Zeigyam Guseinov, has finished the trial of Arif Ganiev, Deputy Chair of the Islamic Party of Azerbaijan (IPA).

The action "Empty Pots", organized by the NGO named "Union of Unemployed for Employment", was held near the building of parliament in Tbilisi.

For more than two years, photojournalists Olga Kravets, Maria Morina and Oksana Yushko have been making photos of the capital of Chechnya; their works are forming the multimedia project "Grozny: Nine Cities". To have the project finished, a fundraising campaign was launched on the Internet.

In connection with adoption of a bill on criminalization of denial of genocide by the Senate of France, broadcasting station Media FM in Azerbaijan removed songs performed by French singers and all the songs in the French language from the air today.

Two residents of Derbent kidnapped a resident of the same town and were keeping him by force in a cellar of a gym for the purpose of extortion of two million rubles from him. The kidnapped mad managed to escape and he did it by means of killing one of the abductors, the Ministry of Interior Affairs of Dagestan reports.

Discharge of treacle into the water area of the Black Sea occurred near the settlement of Volna, Temriuk district of Krasnodar region, at a sea terminal of "Food Ingredients" limited company, "Ecological Watch on North Caucasus" reports.

About 180 workers from Uzbekistan in Volgograd region have to spend the winter in tents in an open field being unable to go home because they have not received their salary.

Adam Gagiev, resident of the settlement of Ekazhevo, Nazran district, who disappeared in Ingushetia on January, 5, was found in a social rehabilitation center in Moscow.

Convicts in "Nubarashen" prison of Yerevan went on a hunger strike. The protestors sentenced to life imprisonment for murders demand reconsideration of their criminal cases.

The mitigation of sentences to those guilty of murdering Yuri Volkov adopted by the Russian Supreme Court will not lead to mass protests, said Mikhail Remizov, President of the National Strategy Institute. Fans of the "Spartak" FC also believe that shortening of the terms would not cause any broad social response.

Relatives of Aslan Cherkesov, a native of Nalchik, convicted to twenty years in prison for murdering Yegor Sviridov, are outraged by the decision of the Supreme Court of Russia to mitigate his term by two months only. Cherkesov's relatives and fellow-countrymen do not exclude new protest actions in his support.