News

The traffic flow along the Transcaucasian Highway ("Transcam") connecting South Ossetia with the Republic of North Ossetia-Alania (RNO-A) has been completely restored.

Andrei Keilin, a resident of Karachaevo-Circassia, who was earlier accused of murdering two students in Stavropol and kept for some time at the pre-trial detention facility (SIZO), has decided to sue law enforcement bodies and claim compensation of moral damage in the sum of 1 million roubles.

The yesterday's too lenient, in the opinion of the Chechen party, verdict to Lieutenant Colonel Korgun, guilty of murdering a woman-resident of the Shatoi District of Chechnya, can result in sharp worsening of relations between militaries and civil authorities, the "Kommersant" newspaper writes today.

According to Eugenia Zhivkova, Rapporteur of the PACE Monitoring Committee, the Azerbaijani journalism in general - and the printed one in particular - is highly politicized.

The United Opposition of Georgia has held a two-hour action under the motto "Thieves of Votes" in the centre of Tbilisi, in Rustaveli Avenue, and accused President Mikhail Saakashvili and Levan Tarkhnishvili, Chairman of the Central Electoral Commission of Georgia, of falsification of the January 5 election.

Sergey Rozhkov, a journalist from the city of Tuapse, Krasnodar Territory, was detained at night of February 2 in the house of his relative, when he was preparing a lawful protest action. According to the journalist, he was handcuffed, beaten and thrown into the luggage compartment of the militia's "Zhiguli" car.

By their one-sided coverage of the pre-election campaign, the TV Channels of Armenia, including the private ones, have really created compelling obstacles for the first Armenian president in the pre-election race.

On the outcomes of another inspection of the custody conditions of inmates kept at the Chernokozovo Corrective Colony No. 2, the Prosecutor's Office of Chechnya has not confirmed that convicts are tortured in this facility and the custody conditions are intolerable.

Military actions and special operations undertaken in the Caucasus with the aim to eliminate the threat of terror are inefficient in struggling against radicalism, but on the contrary, they strengthen it, asserts Ruslan Aushev, the first President of Ingushetia.

On February 7, 2008, the Khamovniki Court of Moscow ruled to cancel the conviction record from Anton Stepanenko, imam of the city of Pyatigorsk, under the verdict of the Pyatigorsk City Court of the Stavropol Territory of March 30, 2007.

Azamat Akhkubekov, one of those accused of attacking power agencies of Kabardino-Balkaria, has sent a petition to the chair of the court Mohamed Tashuev with a complaint against the treatment of defendants during convoying. If the complaint is not satisfied, Akhkubekov is going to refuse from taking part in the process.

The advocates of Farkhad Aliev, former Minister of Economic Development of Azerbaijan, remained dissatisfied with the medical examination of their client. Elton Guliev, one of ex-minister's defenders, has stated that Aliev's transfer to the prison clinic was caused not by care of his health but by desire to prevent his meeting with PACE co-Rapporteurs.

The "Voice of Beslan" public organization created by those who suffered from terror acts is changing its name to the "Voice of Beslan" All-Russian Public Organization of Terror Act Victims.

On February 7, the Grozny Garrison Military Court sentenced Alexei Korgun, Lieutenant Colonel of Internal Troops of the Russian MIA, guilty of the death of a woman-resident of the Shatoy District of Chechnya, to three years of conditional imprisonment.

Sources in the Prosecutor's Office of Ingushetia refute the information that dozens of people detained on January 26 during mass disorders in Nazran are still under arrest.

On February 5, in North Ossetia, the public organization "Styr Nykhas" held a sitting with participation of the Committees "Voice of Beslan" and "Beslan Mothers", where a decision was passed to found the Board in charge of assessing of the investigation of the Beslan tragedy.

The Tonshaev Court of the Nizhni Novgorod Region has refused to apply the procedure of early conditional release to Boris Stomakhin, publicist of the website of Chechen separatists "Kavkaz-Centre" who was sentenced to 5 years of colony for kindling interethnic enmity and extremism.

On February 4, the Supreme Court of North Ossetia rejected the supervisory complaint of the public organization "Voice of Beslan", in which the relatives of the casualties of the Beslan terror act had asked to consider the materials of the Leninskiy Court about re-registration of the organization and to cancel the decision of this court.

Residents of Chechnya continue complaining that compensations for the houses lost during the conflict can be received, only if one pays back a half of the sum to bureaucrats as the so-called "otkat" (kick-back).

In the Pushkin Square in the centre of Moscow, a picket was held in memory of the victims of the clean-up ("zachistka") conducted eight years ago in Novye Aldy settlement located in Grozny, the capital of Chechnya.