News

The Caucasus is overwhelmed with rumours about secret "death squadrons", which are murdering militants and their helpers. The "Newsweek" magazine has concluded, having held its investigation, that the notion of "death squadrons" is just a nice symbol, most likely backed by local operative agents.

In the Kayakent District of Dagestan, near Bashlykent village, a large terror act on the gas pipeline Mozdok-Kazimagomed was prevented, as reported by the group of public relations of the Department for Dagestan of the FSB.

The Human Rights Watch (HRW) has called the world community to urge Georgia and Russia to make responsible those who had broken the laws of war and was involved in deaths of peaceful residents and destructions in the course of the military conflict in Southern Caucasus in summer of 2008.

As reported to journalists by Araz Azimov, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan, opening of communications is an important component of negotiations on Karabakh settlement.

The "Laura and Medni" studio of design and fashion, the largest in Northern Caucasus, will be opened in the Chechen capital by the end of October. The studio will be engaged in developing clothes for Chechen women with account of national traditions and customs.

The government of Armenia has announced the monastic complexes of the Lori Region to be tourist centres, having named this region as "Northern Gate". The Ministry of Economy was given 6 months for drafting a development programme of this tourist centre and bringing it to the government.

On October 2, Heads of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of Russia and Abkhazia Sergey Lavrov and Sergey Shamba signed an agreement on visa-free travels, which will allow Abkhazians and Russians crossing their border not only by foreign documents, but also by their domestic passports. It is expected that the agreement will come into force in 30 days.

Head of North Ossetia Taimuraz Mamsurov said at today's meeting on problems of refugees and forced migrants that Ingushes can freely return to the Prigorodny District; the authorities of North Ossetia will raise no obstacles to the process.

The health condition of the schoolboys from Pelagiada village, Shpakovskiy District, Stavropol Territory, hospitalized on October 1-2 with symptoms of intestinal poisoning, is now noticeably better; at present it is satisfactory. The "Caucasian Knot" correspondent was told about at the Ministry of Public Health of the Stavropol Territory.

Employees of the Department of the Federal Service for Punishment Enforcement (known as UFSIN) for the Astrakhan Region and militiamen have prevented mass disorders with participation of prisoners and their relatives in the local high security corrective colony No. 2.

The European Union (EU) has allocated one million euros on prison reform in Georgia. This became known on October 1 at the international conference, opened in Tbilisi under the project "Torture Prevention in Georgia".

In the evening on October 1, in the southwest of Moscow, unidentified persons accomplish murder of a citizen of Armenia, as reported by law enforcement bodies of the Russian capital.

Today, the Baku Centre of Journalism hosted a ceremony of rewarding Einullah Fatullaev, editor-in-chief of newspapers "Real Azerbaijan" and "Gyundelik Azerbaijan", who is now serving his 8.5-year imprisonment, with the annual award of the Amnesty International "For journalism under threat".

In the city of Prokhladnoe, Kabardino-Balkaria, where a special operation on neutralization of militants was conducted, the counterterrorist operation (CTO) regime is now cancelled. In the course of the operation in this city, one militiaman was lost and three wounded; and three supposed militants were killed. Besides, a local woman has suffered.

The Prosecutor's Office of Georgia has concluded a procedural deal with the basic figure in the case of the so-called "Mukhrovani mutiny" Giya Gvaladze and with other 12 defendants. All of them have already been interrogated by the court.

A group of residents of South Ossetia, victims of the August war of 2008, addressed for help to Russia's top leadership. In their letter, addressed to Dmitri Medvedev and Vladimir Putin, they have accused the leaders of their republic of disrupting the schedule of restoration works.

On September 30, in the course of the meeting with the bosses of local power agencies in Grozny, Ruslan Alkhanov, the MIA head, said that from the start of the year 84 militants were killed in the territory of the republic. He also noted that for the same period, according to power agents, 43 young men joined the armed underground, and 11 of them left for the forest and mountains in September.

The investigation believes that Albert Saaev, a resident of Dagestan, who was detained in Moscow, was involved in hacking the website "Chechnya Today" and placing threats to Chechen president Ramzan Kadyrov there.

The law enforcement bodies of Chechnya report that they have established the person of the terrorist-suicide bomber who tried today in the morning to blow up the building of the police station in Starye Atagi village in the Grozny District of the republic.

Today at the trial on the case about the events in Nalchik on October 13, 2005, held by the Supreme Court of Kabardino-Balkaria, defendant Mironov moved a petition to summon again the coded witnesses with pseudonyms "Pushkin", "Tchaikovsky", "Seliverstov" and others, who already evidenced to the court.