News

The Day of Chechen Women was celebrated in Chechnya. The cities and towns of the republic hosted festivals and concerts, and in the evening of September 18 and the holiday was marked by a ten-minute fireworks in the city of Grozny.

A resident of the Kurchaloi District of Chechnya came to the police station to confess to the murder of his close female relative for "immoral behaviour".

Strikes of metallurgists in Georgia and dispersal by the police of a protest action against violations of their rights; decision of the Russian Supreme Court to uphold the verdict to the persons accused of killing lawyer Markelov in Moscow; Jubilee Investment Forum in Sochi, which brought together more than 6500 participants; celebration of Unity Day of the Republic Dagestan and new resonant crimes, - look these and other events in the Caucasus in the review of the week of September 12-18, 2011, prepared by the "Caucasian Knot".

In the town of Mozdok, an investigation against two policemen from the police regiment of the private security department of the Chechen Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) is under process. The police officers are suspected of arms trafficking in the territory of North Ossetia. This was reported by the Investigatory Department of the Investigatory Committee (IC) of North Ossetia.

Today, after a three-month break, the hearings were resumed at the trial on the case of the attack on Nalchik on October 13, 2005. The representative of the public prosecution has demanded to keep the accused under the custody and arrest those defendants who were earlier released on recognizance not to leave.

Today in the centre of the city of Makhachkala more than 100 residents of the village of Gubden of Karabudakhkent District of Dagestan held a rally demanding to solve social problems and to stop the illegal sale of lands of the former Agricultural Production Company (APC).

An officer of the Prosecutor's Office was detained in Ingushetia on suspicion of organizing illegal armed formation (IAF). This was reported today by the Investigatory Committee of the Russian Federation (ICRF).

On September 18 in the village of Yermolovka of Adler District of Sochi, Suren Gazaryan and Maria Ukhova, the activists of the "Ecological Watch for Northern Caucasus", who headed for the area of the mountain village of Aibga where limestone was extracted to conduct a public inspection, were detained. According to the "Ecological Watch for Northern Caucasus", the limestone is mined there illegally.

At night on September 19 Abakarkidi Magomedov, ex-Chairman of the Dagestani Diaspora in Yaroslavl, was killed in the city.

In the city of Krasnodar, law enforcement officers hampered holding the protest "Picket-19", notwithstanding the permission on the rally.

A rally was held in the village of Duisi of the Pankisi Gorge of Georgia, at which participants demanded to stop criminal process against teacher Asmat Khangoshvili, the employee of the "Robin Scott" Foundation. She is suspected of drug storage.

Due to the contracts signed by representatives of the Rostov Region at the 10th International Investment Forum in Sochi, soon the region will have six new production facilities. The total value of contracts is nearly 21 billion roubles, while the number of new jobs to be created at new enterprises is around 1200.

It is suspected that one of the farms of the Semikarakorsk District of the Rostov Region may use slaves' labour. According to Anna Udyarova, a lawyer of the Anti-Discrimination Centre "Memorial", this information arrived to the "hotline" of the Centre in Moscow. Then, rights defenders addressed the Prosecutor's Office of the Rostov Region, where they were promised to report results of the check on September 19.

The Dagestani Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) conducts a pre-investigation check of the fact of beating of Omar Magomedov, a journalist of the North-Caucasian Bureau of NTV in Dagestan. According to Maria Bezborodova, the press secretary of the channel, NTV will seek to punish those who had attacked the reporter.

A strong fire occurred in the two-story apartment building at No. 127 in Agmashenebeli Avenue in the centre of the capital of Georgia, leaving 10 families homeless.

On September 16, the city of Izberbash (Dagestan) hosted a sitting of the local commission for adaptation of people who decided to stop their terrorist and extremist activities to peaceful life. It was attended by relatives of the persons searched by law enforcement bodies as helpers to members of illegal armed formations (IAFs).

Within the large-scale events dated to celebrations of the 20th anniversary of independence of Armenia, on September 16, an official ceremony of commissioning the new terminal of the Zvartnots Airport took place.

The credit has been allocated to support the country's reforms.

In October, one of the largest privately-owned Russian oil companies – the Open Joint-Stock Company (OJSC) "Lukoil" – plans to lay the "first stone" of the future petrochemical complex in the Stavropol Territory.

Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili has personally handed over a passport of Georgian citizen to the famous Russian conductor Mikhail Arkadiev. The ceremony took place on September 15 after the concert, which the conductor gave at the Conservatory of Tbilisi.