News

Today at 9:52 a.m., a special aircraft of the Russian Ministry for Emergencies took off from the airport of the Caucasian Mineral Waters to take four heavily injured victims of the Pyatigorsk explosions for treatment to Moscow.

After May 15, 2009, when a suicide bomber blew himself up for the first time after cancellation of the counterterrorist operation (CTO) regime, as of today, under estimates of the "Caucasian Knot", the regions of Northern Caucasus saw 22 terror acts committed by suicide bombers. As a result of these explosions, 92 persons perished in total, and 414 more were wounded.

Today, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) of Georgia received the offered amendments to the national Constitution, according to which although the President will lose his right to appoint ministers but will preserve the title of Commander-in-Chief and the right to form the top management of the Joint Staff.

Today, the Basmanny Court of Moscow has prolonged till November 3 the arrest of Evgenia Khasis, accused of complicity in the murder of lawyer Stanislav Markelov.

Today at 4:15 p.m. Moscow time in the centre of the resort city of Pyatigorsk, Stavropol Territory, a car stuffed with explosive was blown up. 30 persons were injured; three of them are in resuscitation, their condition is grave.

In Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan, two suspected militants were liquidated, who, by the official data, had opened fire on militiamen. As a result, one of the employees of the MIA, a boy and a woman were wounded.

As stated by Oyus Gurtuev, deputy chair of the Board of Elders of the Balkar People (BEBP), the protest action of a group of residents of Kabardino-Balkaria in Moscow has lost any further sense; the hunger strike should be stopped, and European structures should be addressed for help.

On August 13, 2010, Makhmud Akhmedov, earlier beaten by militiamen at interrogation, was discharged from the Central Republic's Hospital. As a result of his trauma, Makhmud lost hearing by one ear. Doctors conclude that in case of necessary treatment and favourable conditions the hearing can be restored, runs the statement of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial".

As a result of an explosion, committed today in the morning by a suicide bomber at the check point in the North-Ossetian-Ingush border, two militiamen were lost and three more wounded.

Today, the "Siberia" Airline ("S7 Airlines") has announced that since August 23 it will start its flights to Georgia.

The broad-scale subbotnik (citizens' volunteer work) started in mid-June and aimed to clean streets of the capital of Chechnya of rubbish and household wastes is not over yet. Some of the sectors, into which Grozny was split, failed to cope with the task to improve and clean the territory, although initially ten days were allocated for cleaning the city streets. The protraction of the event causes residents' bewilderment.

In Dagestan, Rumil Begeyev, who was in federal search for murdering a militiaman, committed at his detention on January 22 in Derbent. Earlier, Begeyev's relatives had stated that they failed to receive guarantees from law enforcement bodies of observance of legality in exchange for his readiness to surrender.

The exhibition of India-made goods, held in Batumi, the capital of Adzharia, within the programme of popularization of Indian culture in Transcaucasia, will last till August 28.

After the decision of the Ministry of Education of Armenia to deprive a number of higher schools of their licenses, over 2000 students will be able to move, in the period from August 17 to September 15, to other establishments to continue their studies. This was announced to journalists by Aga Avetisyan, deputy minister of sciences and education of Armenia.

On August 15-16, it took local electricians almost 24 hours to repair a broken electric cable. In some city districts, where water delivery depends on electricity, people remained without water and electric power in 40-degree heat.

The Supreme Court of Chechnya has sentenced Albert Saaev, who cracked official websites of the authorities of several republics of Northern Caucasus, to 2.5 years of high security colony for complicity to militants.

The nationalist Nikita Tikhonov, accused of murdering lawyer Stanislav Markelov and journalist Anastasia Baburova in January 2009, will continue staying in custody.

After eight years of suspension, the TV Company "А1+" will making everything possible to win objectivity of the National Commission on Radio and Television (NCRT) and will surely take part in the contest for the right to broadcast, as Mesrop Movsesyan, director of the Company, told journalists.

A number of local experts believe that the statement of some field commanders about exit away from subordination to Dokku Umarov is a symptom of serious contradictions within the armed underground and an abrupt drop of the authority of the Amir of the Caucasus, as Umarov calls himself.

The offer put forward by the authorities of the Krasnodar Territory to move the gambling zone "Azov-City" to Anapa was negatively perceived by their counterparts in the Rostov Region, who believe that it will poke away investors and damage the business.