News

As reported by Vladimir Markin, a spokesman for the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF), the mayor of Makhachkala Said Amirov was detained on suspicion of organizing a murder of an investigator in Dagestan. On June 1, the police blocked Parkhomenko Street in Makhachkala and, according to eyewitnesses, surrounded the house of Said Amirov. A source from the republic's law enforcement bodies said that the mayor was detained and taken out of the city in a helicopter.

The data on terrorist activity in Russia in 2012, published in the annual report of the US State Department, are essentially diverging from the data conducted by the "Caucasian Knot" on the basis of its own materials and information from open sources. The report of US State Department contains information about 182 terror attacks committed in Russia in 2012. Meanwhile, the statistics on the North Caucasus compiled by the "Caucasian Knot" shows a significantly lower figure.

The historical centre of Baku has launched a two-day festival "European Town", which has aroused a great interest in residents of the capital of Azerbaijan, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports. The festival was held with the aim to expand the knowledge of European values and promote Azerbaijan-EU relations.

A picket under the motto "For Russian circus without cruelty" that was held on the embankment of Volgograd brought together about forty protesters. The "Caucasian Knot" correspondent has learnt from Tatiana Ryabinova, the organizer of the picket and coordinator of the "Vita" Centre in Defence of Animals' Rights, that the picket of 30 people had been agreed with the authorities.

On Monday, the Oktiabrsky District Court of Stavropol continued the preliminary hearing on the case of Igor Bestuzhy, the former head of the city administration. It was held behind closed doors; and the court retired to the jury room until June 5.

In the city of Nakhichevan, authorities are forcibly evicting nine families of retired militaries and veterans of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict from their apartments, the residents of the military township are complaining. "In 1987, we received a warrant for the apartment. Now, the authorities of Nakhichevan have brought the police here and demand to quickly abandon the flat," a veteran Abdullah Orudjov told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

In the micro-district Yubileiny of Krasnodar, about 20 young parents took part in a picket with a demand to the local authorities to solve the problem of shortage of places in kindergartens of their micro-district. The picket was dated to the International Children's Day.

The theologian Talekh Bagirzade, who is kept in the SIZO (pre-trial prison), located in the Baku suburb of Kyurdakhany, was put into a dungeon for five days. It happened on May 28 and was associated with the detainee's open appeal, addressed to leaders of foreign states and urging them to be "objective in assessing the situation in Azerbaijan," a Bagirzade's advocate said.

The father of Ibragim Todashev, who was killed during interrogation by FBI agents, received a USA visa, said Kheda Saratova, an activist of the Information Centre "Objective". On June 1, he flew to the USA to take the body of his son.

On Monday, the Nariman District Court in Baku sentenced six believers, who were arrested for taking part in the action against the ban on hijabs in schools, to the terms ranging from one year and nine months to six years in prison. Advocates of the convicted disagreed with the verdict and said that they would appeal against it.

On June 1, at about 2:30 a.m., the tent camp at the landing stage in the Volgograd Region was attacked by unidentified persons, who arrived in cars, beat the defenders of the building and burned down the camp.

On June 1, the city of Karachaevsk hosted a rally in support of its mayor Soltan Semyonov. Initially, an event to mark the Children's Day had been planned in the square in front of the city administration; however, it turned into a spontaneous rally in support of the mayor.

The government of Ingushetia, the school staff and school graduates refute the information disseminated in social networks that the Prime Minister of the Republic of Ingushetia Musa Chiliev personally searched graduates, in order to find cribs, prior to the Unified State Examination (USE) in the village of Troitskaya.

In the opinion of Magomed Magomedrasulov, the chairman of the Makhachkala City Assembly, the Mayor of Makhachkala Said Amirov is not guilty of the incriminated crimes. Amirov was detained on June 1 on suspicion of organizing a murder of an employee of the Investigating Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF) in Dagestan.

On May 30, in front of the Mayoralty of Tbilisi, vulnerable citizens held their protest, demanding to solve their housing problems. In response, a Mayoralty official said that the state has no money to fix the problem immediately.

As stated by Levon Zurabyan, the head of the parliamentary faction of the Armenian National Congress (ANC), during a protest action in Yerevan, the international community is more interested in Armenia's geopolitical problems, rather than in the democratic situation in the country, while the activities of "foreign missionaries" cannot be considered satisfactory.

About three hundred residents of North Ossetia have staged a rally against the construction of a cement plant in Alagir. The protesters adopted a resolution that demands to cancel all the legal acts, allowing the Ural Mining and Metallurgical Company (UMMC) to build the plant.

On May 30, Ilgar Mamedov, the leader of the civil movement "Republican Alternative" ("ReAl"), who is kept at the SIZO (pre-trial prison), was placed into a dungeon, said advocate Khalid Bagirov. According to his story, the defence was not informed about it.

The Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili is suspected of paying - from the state budget for his rejuvenation injections of Botox - a total of 11,400 US dollars - and bought a picture worth about 6000 pounds sterling; this data from the expense reports of the State Security Special Service SSSS was presented by Irina Imerlishvili, an MP from the ruling coalition "Georgian Dream".

As stated by Nikolai Yarst, a journalist and a freelance reporter of the "Public Television of Russia" (PTR), his criminal prosecution initiated by the UVD (Interior Department) of Sochi and the charges of illegal possession and transportation of drugs are the result of his professional activities. He also stressed that the drugs had been planted on him.