News

The today's official press of Azerbaijan has published the list of places allotted for holding mass actions in 56 cities and district centres of Baku. These places have been defined by local executive bodies according to the Law "On Freedom of Assembly".

In the course of verifying operative data, employees of the State Security Service (SSS) of Abkhazia detained an agent of Georgian special agencies - a woman-citizen of Abkhazia Diana Shedaniya, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports.

In Armenia, according to the decision of the court, Armen Sarkisyan, who has served five years of imprisonment accused of organizing the murder of Tigran Nagdalyan, Director of the Public Armenian Television, has received an early-conditional release.

The Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial" has prepared a new issue of the Information Bulletin "Chronicle of Violence" for August 2008, related to the conflict in the Northern Caucasus. According to human rights activists, kidnappings, attacks of unknown persons, bombardments and murders happen practically every day in conflict.

Alexander Cherkasov, an expert of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial", who has visited South Ossetia, has stated that prior to start the war Georgia had systematically evacuated Georgian population from the conflict zone.

The President of South Ossetia Eduard Kokoity has stated that his republic is not going to give up its independence and to be a part of Russia, although they are grateful to it for saving the Ossetian people.

Abkhazia is going to enter the CIS and to submit an application on joining the United State of Russia and Belarus, President Sergey Bagapsh has declared.

Russia should cease shirking its obligations to withdraw troops and "clear off" Georgia, said Sean McCormack, press secretary of the US Department of State, on September 10.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has stated that some nongovernmental and non-commercial organizations (NGOs and NCOs) in Russia had been preparing a breakaway of a number of republics should Russia had failed to defend South Ossetia.

Vitaly Churkin, Russia's permanent UN representative, believes that ban to further militarization of Georgia will contribute to normalization of the situation with Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

Republican Dana Rohrabacher, deputy chairman of subcommittee for international organizations of the House of Representatives of the US Congress, has stated that according to the data of American reconnaissance services the latest warfare in South Ossetia was started by Georgia.

Last night, in the south-east of Chechnya, a group of unknown persons kidnapped a woman-local resident. Later, her body with numerous gunshot wounds was found by employees of law enforcement bodies. The motives of the crime remain unknown.

Commanders of Georgian military forces have reported at the Brussels NATO Headquarters that they were against the military invasion into South Ossetia. They assert that should they have been given a chance, they would have persuaded President Mikhail Saakashvili not to invade.

In Kabardino-Balkaria, the case of beating Miloslav Bitokov, editor-in-chief of the "Paper of the South", has been delivered to the Russian Investigatory Committee for the city of Nalchik.

The Appeal Court of France has rejected the Georgia's petition to extradite former Defence Minister of the country Irakliy Okruashvili.

Alexander Bastrykin, Chairman of the Investigatory Committee under the Russian Prosecutor's Office, has ordered his subordinate Departments for the South Federal District (SFD) to make an objective inquiry into the death of journalist Magomed Evloev, owner of the oppositional website "Ingushetia.Ru".

The European Union believes that in spite of the statements of the head of Russian MFA Sergey Lavrov EU observers shall be deployed in the territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

For the third time already, residents of the Imereti Valley have stopped the builders of the "Second Cargo District of Sochi Port", or more precisely, the construction of the protective fence around this object. Same as before, the builders could not present any required permits.

Mikael Ezhiev, leader of the NGO named "Human Rights Centre of the Chechen Republic" has stated that residents of Chechnya Salavatov, Matsiev, Dzhantemirov and Khabibulaev, sentenced last week by the Supreme Court of Chechnya to long terms of imprisonment, gave their evidences of guilt under torture.

The son of the ex-president of Georgia Zviad Gamsakhurdia - Tsotne Gamsakhurdia, detained on September 3 in the Tbilisi Airport under accusations of a putsch attempt, has announced a hunger strike.