News

Today, three participants of the journalists' picket held in front of the Office of the Council of Europe in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, were detained by the police.

The explosion of a bus in Tolyatti on October 31, 2007, that killed eight persons was a result of careless handling a self-made explosive by suspect Evgeniy Vakhrushev.

The Moscow authorities have prohibited the picket in memory of Aslan Maskhadov, the second President of Chechnya and leader of separatists killed three years ago that was planned for March 13.

Cossacks of the Stavropol Regional Cossack Society held their extraordinary round (meeting) and dismissed Ataman Mikhail Serkov who had appealed to give up Russian citizenship in protest against poor investigation of the murder of Ataman Andrei Khanin and corruption in the Stavropol Territory.

The opposition of Armenia plans to hold a rally on March 21, immediately after removal of the state of emergency. In compliance with the current legislation, oppositionists are planning to notify the Mayoralty of Yerevan about the rally.

The Supreme Court of Kabardino-Balkaria has cancelled the verdict passed by the Elborus District Court in relation to two ROVD employees - M. Mashezov and M. Baichekuev, and sent the case to a new investigation.

The delegates of the extraordinary Congress of Ingush Nation, who represent the country's civil society, have addressed President Vladimir Putin and First Vice-Premier Dmitri Medvedev with a question: "Until when will Murat Zyazikov's clique of bureaucrats execute their arbitrariness in Ingushetia?"

President of Armenia Robert Kocharyan has partially cancelled the state of emergency. Five opposition parties and public organizations are returned the right to act. The President has also ordered to seek other legal grounds for operation of mass media.

Today, the Service of National Security of Armenia has arrested Alexander Arzumanyan, head of the election office of Levon Ter-Petrosyan and former Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Ararat Zurabyan, one of the members of the election office and chairman of the Armenian All-National Movement.

Charges of taking part in mass disorders in Yerevan, during which eight persons were lost, have been presented to 59 persons by the Prosecutor's Office of Armenia.

Today, Giorgi Tsagareishvili, one of the leaders of the opposition and representative of the Movement for United Georgia, where Irakliy Okruashvili, ex-Minister of Defence of Georgia, is the leader, has joined the hunger strike held in front of the Parliament of Georgia. Now, there are about 15 persons holding a protest hunger strike at the building of the Parliament.

Tonight at 7:45 p.m. local time, the Constitutional Court of Armenia announced its verdict on the suit lodged by two presidential candidates - Tigran Karapetyan and Levon Ter-Petrosyan - on recognition of the outcomes of the presidential election held on February 19 null and void.

Additional forces of the Internal Troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia and armoured vehicles have been deployed in the city of Nazran (Ingushetia).

Today, in Nalchik at the Memorial to Victims of Repressions against Balkar People, a public rally was organized in memory of the victims of mass deportation of Balkars in 1943.

On the day of the third anniversary of the death of Aslan Maskhadov the participants of the Movement against War in Northern Caucasus have addressed Patriarch Alexis II for assistance in giving out of the remains of the former President of Chechnya to his relatives.

According to the latest data of the State Office of Public Prosecutor of Armenia, 125 persons were brought to police stations during the disorders on March 1, of them 46 persons were indicted and arrested, and 20 more are detained and wait for indictments to be presented to them within three days.

The Coalition of Nongovernmental Organizations of Georgia has passed a petition in support of the Armenian people and condemned repressions against supporters of Levon Ter-Petrosyan in Armenia.

The Dagestan Republic's Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF) has declared that in Dagestan, the observers of the Party registered rough and mass distortions of the will of the voters during the presidential election.

Today in Armenia, Levon Ter-Petrosyan had a meeting with John Prescott, chairman of the temporary commission of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), who is now in Yerevan.

Today the Yasamal District Court of Baku has sentenced Ganimat Zakhidov, editor-in-chief of the Azerbaijani oppositional newspaper "Azadlyg", to four years of deprivation of freedom on charges of "hooliganism and causing damage to the health of a human."