News

The conflict around the "Vostok" (East) special-purpose battalion, which is commanded by the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Russian General Staff (the so-called "GRU"), continues to escalate. The investigation now possesses new information about possible involvement of special fighters in one more crime.

Today at night, in the centre of Tbilisi, a policeman has shot dead Giorgiy Gamtsemlidze, an activist of one of the electoral offices of the ruling party of Georgia - the United National Movement.

At the trial of the activists of Armenian opposition, the women-eyewitnesses in the case have stated that their earlier evidences that the three defendants had hampered the election process on February 19 were made under pressure, and rejected them.

Kakhaber Shartava, one of the leaders of the United Opposition and leader of the National Forum Party, has accused the governor of the Kvemo-Kartli District of bribing and intimidating local voters. The governor rejects the accusations.

The parents of the students who came to Stavropol from Chechnya and Ingushetia to get their education are concerned with frequent murders "of Caucasus-origin nationals" committed in this city and want to take their children away.

A court in the Astrakhan Region has appointed three years of conditional imprisonment to the doctor who had refused to provide free-of-charge hospitalization to a seven-year-old boy with a compound arm fracture; with the result that later surgeons had to amputate the arm.

The United Opposition has promulgated another revelatory video record. It depicts Goderdzi Bukiya, one of the candidates from the party in power "United National Movement", who confesses that he is engaged in business.

On May 6, the centre of Elista, the capital of Kalmykia, was the venue of celebrations dated to the four-year anniversary of the first issue of the "Elista Panorama" newspaper; the event grew into a spontaneous rally.

Today, the Ulyanovsk Regional Court has upheld the decision of the City Court of Dimitrovgrad to reject to apply the early conditional release to former colonel Yuri Budanov who is serving his ten years' term for murdering Elza Kungaeva, a resident of Chechnya.

The court has added two months to the term of pre-trial custody of Ararat Zurabyan, leader of the oppositional Armenian All-National Movement, as Karen Karapetyan, a member of the Movement Board, has informed.

Leaders of human rights and other public organizations of Chechnya are concerned with slow rates of de-mining the territory. They also are dissatisfied with the intention of the Russian Ministry for Emergencies to finance mine clearing in Serbia and forget about mines in Chechnya.

Maxim Shevchenko, a member of the Public Chamber and head of the Centre for Strategic Researches of Religion and Politics in Modern World, has treated the judicial decision on the claim of the Ministry of Property and Land Relations of Dagestan against the Regional Public Foundation "Charitable Women's Hospital" to be a tragedy and disaster.

Valery Giorgobiani, a candidate for majority deputy in the Tsager Constituency of Georgia from the party in power United National Movement, has refused to take part in the elections after his compromising audio record was made public.

The French city of Nancy (Department of Meurthe and Moselle) has hosted a protest rally against deportation of illegal migrants from Chechnya. About 150 persons took part in the event.

Tonight, at about 7:30-8:30 p.m. local time, employees of the Special Investigatory Group of the State Office of the Public Prosecutor of Armenia made a sanctioned search in the office of the opposition party "Homeland and Honour".

On May 5, in one of the mosques of the Pliev Municipal District in Ingushetia, a number of mosque parishioners were detained.

Following the visit of the Mission of the UNESCO and IUCN, the local Prosecutor's Office has started its own check in the Maikop District of Adygea in the territory of the World Natural Heritage "Zapadny Kavkaz" (Western Caucasus); the check may last till the end of May.

Despite the authorities' assurances about no-break electricity supply in Makhachkala, certain districts of Dagestan capital have no electricity for some days already. City dwellers are again ready to go out for protest actions.

Today, the European Commission has announced allocation of two million euros to Georgia as support to preparation of the parliamentary elections to be held on May 21.

Valery Giorgobiani, a candidate for a majority deputy from the party in power of Georgia - the United National Movement - is blackmailing people. This was stated today by Kakha Kukava, one of the leaders of the Conservative Party and a member of the United Opposition, in a press conference, having made public an audio record of the sitting held in the administration of the Tsager District.