News

The Administrative Court of Yerevan is considering a claim lodged by Gagik Dzhangiryan, former Deputy General Public Prosecutor, who was arrested during the post-election period and is kept in custody. The applicant claims to nullify the decrees of former President Robert Kocharyan, by which he had been dismissed and deprived of the rank of Class 1 State Adviser of Justice.

Magomed Miziev, Public Prosecutor of the Chegem District of Kabardino-Balkaria, has sent a letter to Valery Ustov, head of Investigatory Department for Kabardino-Balkaria of the Investigatory Committee at the Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation, expressing his opinion that Kerim Malkarov, detained on murder suspicion, was charged without sufficient grounds.

The July 7-8 counterterrorist operation undertaken in the Khasavyurt District and the city of Khasavyurt was ethnically oriented, since only houses where Avars live were searched. The "Caucasian Knot" correspondent has learnt about it from Magomedrasul Guseinov, a resident of Khasavyurt and Deputy Chair of the Executive Committee of the Avar National Council.

Georgia has recalled her ambassador from the Russian Federation in the context of recent events in the conflict zones in Abkhazia and South Ossetia and Russia's actions. This was announced today evening by Ekaterina Tkeshelashvili, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Georgia, at a special briefing.

The law enforcement bodies of Chechnya insist that no human remains were detected in the territory of a former asphalt factory near the village of Goryacheistochnenskaya in the Grozny District of Chechnya. However, according to human rights activists, it does not mean that people were not massacred there.

The Internet edition named Presa.ge has made a decision to start on July 9 a web broadcasting of the third documentary showing falsifications of parliamentary elections in Georgia on May 21, 2008.

The investigatory committee of the investigatory department for the Kirovskiy District of Makhachkala, which operates under the prosecutor's office, has recognized the journalists of the "Nastoyascheye Vremya" (Present Time) newspaper to be victims in the criminal case initiated against Director General of the edition Rizvan Rizvanov. The corresponding decisions were issued to journalists on July 8.

In Georgia, the Republican Party demands to suspend making amendments in the law "On Citizens' Political Associations", asserting that it will strike the opposition. This was stated on July 8 by David Usupashvili, one of the leaders of the Party.

A boy of 14 from South Ossetia, who disappeared in the evening of July 7, was accused by the Georgian party of espionage and released by Georgia on the following day, July 8, is in a shock condition.

Representatives of ecological organizations assert that the decision of Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin to move a number of Olympic objects away from the Grushevoy Ridge in the Krasnodar Territory does not solve all the environmental problems of the region.

The establishment of the Committee in Defence of Political Prisoners and Repressed Persons was announced today at the press conference that took place in the office of the People's Party of Armenia.

On July 9, the Nasiminskiy District Court of the capital of Azerbaijan, presided by Judge Shain Abdullaev, finished the judicial investigation on Sergey Strekalin's case, accused of inflicting on March 13 a knife wound to the journalist of the "Azadlyg" (Freedom) newspaper.

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has made a statement in support of imprisoned journalist Armand Babadzhanyan's petition on early release.

The Krasnodar Department of the Russian Environment Supervisory Agency ("Rosprirodnadzor") believes that many ecological organizations are deliberately by the actions hampering the resort season. In their turn, ecologists declare that the authorities are concealing the truth about the situation in the Kerch Strait.

Today, Eka Beseliya, secretary general of the oppositional party "For United Georgia", held a press conference, where she called the Georgian public to financially support the sole oppositional TV Company "Kavkasia", the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports.

In the near future, the editor-in-chief of the weekly named "Chernovik" (Blueprint) is going to protest against the decision of the Prosecutor's Office of Dagestan, by which the edition was warned on inadmissibility to breach the Federal Law "On Counteracting Extremist Activities".

The resident of Dagestan, who has been found today in Kizlyar, could have been kidnapped with the aim to exchange him for the girl, who had run away with his relative, as her parents were against their wedding.

Ban Ki-Moon, UN Secretary General, has condemned the recent explosions in the territory of Abkhazia and called to hold an investigation of these incidents and bring the criminals to responsibility.

On July 7, when a counterterrorist operation was conducted in the Khasavyurt District of Dagestan, a family of a lawyer and a federal judge suffered.

The "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports that Rosa Khalishkhova, a resident of the city of Nartkala, Kabardino-Balkaria, who lost her son during the war in Chechnya, has adjudged 200,000 roubles from the Ministry of Defence (MoD) of the Russian Federation as compensation of her moral damage.