News

On April 24, the socio-political situation in Azerbaijan was subject of discussion at the meeting in Baku of the diplomatic corps with the leaders of the oppositional Civil Movement for Democracy" Public Chamber" (CMDPC). The participants of the meeting refer to its confidential character and refuse to comment on diplomats' statements, but note that such contacts are always useful.

According to the investigation, the head of one of the departments of the Volgograd City Mayoralty has embezzled 750,000 roubles through fraudulent actions. The bureaucrat himself denies his guilt.

Public prosecutor's office of Nalchik detected a fact of abuse of authority by an official of Nalchik municipal Administration, i.e. Head of the Department of Communal services and utilities, the supervisory office reports.

This morning armed and masked people wearing camouflage uniforms who introduced themselves as officers of the Department of Interior Affairs of Magaramkent district carried away resident of the settlement of Kiuchhiur, Kurakh district, Ramazan Saidhanov. Location of the kidnapped man is unknown at the moment. This was reported by the man's brother Abdulhamid Saidhanov.

Sergeant Valerian Khudjadze, representative of Georgian peacemaking contingent in Afghanistan, blasted on a mine, the Ministry of Defense of Georgia reported today. The time of the accident was not specified.

The journalist Zaur Guliev, arrested after the events in the city of Guba, told about torture and inhuman treatment applied to him during his stay at the country's Chief Department for Combating Organized Crime (known as GUBOP) of the Azerbaijani Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA). This is stated in his complaint, sent from the Baku SIZO (pre-trial prison) to the NGO "For Human Rights".

Anzor Butba, Ramzi Khashig and Alkhas Khutaba, arrested under the case of an attempt on the president of Abkhazia, have confessed that twice – in November 2011 and on February 10, 2012 – they attempted, together with Rushbey Bartsits, who is now searched, to kill the president, said the General Prosecutor's Office (GPO) of the Republic.

The participants of the Moscow solidarity hunger strike have decided to stop their action, after Oleg Shein's statement that he would quit his hunger strike as soon his supporters, arrested for staging a flash mob "For Fair Elections", were released.

Today, at 5 o'clock in the afternoon, in Makhachkala, in Akushinsky Avenue, five unidentified men attacked and beat Ruslan Gereev, the deputy director general and editor of the political division of the newspaper "Nastoyascheye Vremya" (Present Time), said Milrad Fatullaev, the editor-in-chief.

Supporters of Arthur Dordjiev, who was not approved for the post of city manager, blocked the Elista Mayoralty and tried to storm the building, said Mingiyan Yashaev, the incumbent acting city manager of Elista, the capital of Kalmykia.

The Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial" has sent an appeal to Alexander Bastrykin, Chairman of the Investigatory Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF), asking him to take the criminal case initiated against the policemen who tortured Inal Berov, a resident of Nalchik, under his special supervision.

Today, Oleg Shein, an ex-candidate for the Mayor of Astrakhan and a member of the "Spravedlivaya Rossiya" (Fair Russia) Party, has announced his withdrawal from the political protest hunger strike.

On April 23, Viktor Orban, Prime Minister of Hungary, said that the Hungarian oil company MOL would quit the gas pipeline project named "Nabucco". So far, the company's managers and the authors of the pipeline project have not confirmed the information.

On April 20 in Makhachkala, unidentified persons in masks kidnapped a local resident Zalbek Magomed-Kamilovich Paizulaev, born in 1967. This was announced by his cousin Ramzan Omarov, who addressed human rights activists asking to help to find his relative.

At night on April 24, funeral torch marches to commemorate the victims of the genocide of Armenians in the Ottoman Turkey and the 97th anniversary of the tragedy took place in Yerevan and other cities on the country.

Patimat Murshidova, a resident of the village of Balakhani, Untsukul District of Dagestan, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that she was persecuted by law enforcers.

At the protest action aimed to protect the Mashtots Park in Yerevan, activists held a symbolic funeral ceremony of oligarch Olik Garkhyan.

In the evening on April 23, Stepanakert, the capital of Nagorno-Karabakh, hosted a torchlight march and a rally to commemorate the victims of the genocide of Armenians committed in the Ottoman Empire.

Imadibir Makhiev, 16, who on April 16 was shot in his head by a policeman, was transferred from the Akhvakh Central District Hospital to Makhachkala, to the intensive care unit of the Republic's Clinical Hospital.

In Kaspiisk, employees of the local GOVD (City Interior Division) have asked the believers not to visit the mosque, located in Aeroflotskaya Street, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent was informed by a local resident Abakar Abakarov.