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Relatives of Idris Albogachiev, a resident of Ingushetia, convicted on December 12 for violating disciplinary regulations in a corrective establishments in the Stavropol Territory, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that Idris fell victim to inspectors' and judicial arbitrariness.

On Monday, December 21, leaders and activists of oppositional parties and movements held a protest action in Kutaisi against demolition last Saturday, on December 19, of the Memorial of Glory. When the monument was blown up, Eka Dzhincharadze and her eight-year-old daughter Nino were killed by concrete splinters.

The kidnapping of Georgiy Nakani, a resident of Neitrino village in Kabardino-Balkaria, and disappearance of three residents of the republic in November on their way to the city of Ufa, are the facts in the category of extrajudicial executions, widely practiced in Ingushetia and Dagestan. This is the opinion of Valery Khatazhukov, head of the Kabardino-Balkarian Public Human Rights Centre.

As a result of the wounds obtained at explosion of the car in Nazran on December 16, the third relative - Amirkhan Dzhaniev - has died. Maksharip Aushev's widow Fatima Dzhanieva, who was wounded by the explosion, is able to evidence. Their relative Batyr Dzhaniev, whom the investigation calls the terrorist-suicide bomber, who, allegedly, took revenged for his perished relatives, on the eve of the incident left for Archangelsk, where he studies.

In Moscow, in the context of the explosion of the "Memorial of Glory" in Kutaisi, activists of the "Left-Wing Front" held a non-sanctioned protest action near the embassy of Georgia to Russia. None of the protesters was detained.

In Georgia, the Tbilisi City Court has ruled to put Avtandil Darsavelidze, technical director of the "Sakpetkmretsvi" company, suspected in the case about the explosion of the "Monument of Glory" in Kutaisi, to two-month pre-trial custody.

The government of Georgia and the community of experts differ in estimating the presidential election held in Abkhazia on December 12. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs (MFA) of Georgia made a statement, calling the presidential election in Abkhazia "a farce".

In Makhachkala, a rally was organized by teachers and students of the Dagestan State Polytechnic University (DSPU) against illegal construction launched in the park zone adjacent to the university. Unknown businessmen fell down old trees and during one night laid the basement of a supermarket in the territory of the largest city park.

Two civil society activists - Ilgar Nasibov and Vafadar Eivazov - were summoned to the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) of the Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic (NAR, Azerbaijan) in the context of attack on them on December 15.

The Moscow House of Journalists hosted a ceremony of awarding the first premium of the Moscow Helsinki Group (MHG) in the area of human rights defence for 2009. Natalia Estemirova, a human rights defender and employee of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial", was posthumously awarded "for the courage demonstrated in defence of human rights."

Despite the continuing storm, divers continue pumping fuel from the sunken part of the dry-cargo ship "Aras-1", shipwrecked inshore Sochi.

After the residents of the Imereti Lowland, whose houses happened to get into the zone of Olympic construction, took an active part in a rally in Sochi, Natalia Kalinovskaya, chair of the local self-government partnership named "Psou", felt pressure from the authorities.

During dismantling the "Glory Memorial" in Kutaisi, Nino Dzhincharadze, a girl of 8, and her mother were killed by explosion.

Mussa Khidriev, brother of defendant Maksharip Khidriev, accused of organizing the explosion of the "Neva-Express" train in 2007, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that he has weighty proofs of his brother's innocence.

President of South Ossetia Eduard Kokoity has signed a decree on pardoning three convicted citizens of Georgia. 15 minutes after the document was signed, in the frontier zone, three convicted Georgian minors - Levan Khmiadashvili, Victor Buchukuri and Georgiy Archvadze - were handed over to the Georgian party.

Ahmed Ismailov, a resident of Petrakovskiy settlement, Khasavyurt District of Dagestan, states that militiamen are persecuting him because he is a relative of Magomed Ismailov, 18, who was found murdered on November 26.

The programme of urban redevelopment and construction of the city water supply system is launched in Shusha, Nagorno-Karabakh. The project and cost-estimate works are underway, and in 2-2.5 months a construction tender will be held. This was announced on December 16 by Ara Vardanyan, executive director of the All-Armenian Foundation "Ayastan".

Salamat Gandaev, a pilgrim from Karachai-Circassia, who was detained by law enforcement bodies in the city of Sochi, is suspected of murdering Ismail-Hadji Bostanov, Rector of the Islamic Institute.

According to Mussa Aushev, brother of the Ingush human rights activist Maksharip Aushev, assassinated in October, the version that the car with the Dzhaniev family - Maksharip's relatives, which blew up on December 16, suffered from a gas bottle explosion, is inconsistent. He refers to eyewitnesses who assert that the gas bottle blew up after the first explosion.

In 2009, about one hundred new complaints were lodged from Chechnya to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). They have to do mainly with detentions and disappearances of applicants' relatives. This was explained by Anatoly Kovler, Judge of the European Court from the Russian Federation.