News

The Butyrskiy District Court of Moscow has recognized guilty and sentenced Boris Stomakhin, editor-in-chief of the bulletin "Radical Policy" and journalist of the "Caucasus-Centre" web-site, to five years of imprisonment at a general custody treatment for excitation of religious hatred accomplished publicly with use of mass media.

The Izmailovskiy District Court of Moscow has sentenced three defendants on the case of attacking Zaur Tutov, minister of culture of Kabardino-Balkaria, for conditional deprivation of freedom in a colony-settlement for the terms from twelve to eighteen months.

The murder of the former commander of the "Gorets" (Mountaineer) special squadron, lieutenant colonel of the FSB (Federal Security Bureau) Movladi Baisarov became possible because the FSB operative shelter was removed from him after he had decided to evidence at the Military of the Office of Public Prosecutor on what happens in Chechnya.

Alexander Litvinenko was poisoned under a direct order from the Kremlin, Oleg Gordievskiy, former resident of Soviet special services in Great Britain and one of major deserters from the KGB, has declared.

Ruslan Eliev, 31, a refugee from Chechnya, has disappeared in Baku, capital of Azerbaijan, under unclear circumstances.

About 10 p.m. on November 17, three unknown persons in camouflage and armed with automatic guns rushed into a private house in Kirova Street of the Dongaron village of North Ossetia.

For 12 days in a row already, the refugees of the settlement named "Maiskiy" in the Prigorodny District of North Ossetia have been living in their unheated dillies, since on November 6 the authorities stopped gas supply, and on November 14 disconnected the camp from electricity.

The British police have initiated a criminal case on poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko, former FSB officer.

Today at night in the Grozny District of Chechnya two oil wells have been blown up.

"Murder of Arthur Arutyunyan, head of the Armenian community of the Murmansk Region, is exclusively business-related," Oleg Mnatsakanyan, a member of the community board, believes.

Representatives of political parties of Armenia are indignant with attacks on Armenians in Russia, which have become more frequent.

The Workers' Party of Turkey and a number of other organizations of the country have organized a protest action opposite the building of the French General Consulate in Istanbul under slogans "Genocide of Armenians is an imperialistic lie" and "No to French goods."

Sergey Katanandov, leader of Karelia, has declared that the full Republic's Cabinet of Ministers would be dismissed, should the reprimanded members of the government who are still in their posts "fail to make proper conclusions."

Anzor Astemirov, leader of the Wahhabite underground movement of Kabardino-Balkaria, who is searched by special agencies of Russia and who commanded attacks of extremists on Nalchik in December 2004 and October 2005, has placed his appeal to the authorities of Russia in the Google Video service.

Chechnya residents think that the decision adopted by the State Duma to postpone introduction of the institute of juries by three years in the Republic is an infringement of their rights.

Several tens of ethnic Avar families who fled last year from the village of Borozdinovskaya of the Shelkovskoj District of Chechnya after a punitive clean-up ("zachistka") held there, as a result of which one person was killed and 11 others disappeared, are still living in inhuman conditions near the administrative border of Chechnya and Dagestan.

Turkey has frozen military ties with France, the CNN-Turk TV Company has broadcast tonight with a reference to the commander-in-chief of the Turkish ground troops.

Andronik Margaryan, Prime Minister of Armenia, has stated today to journalists that Armenia counts on a thorough and objective investigation of the Armenian teenager's murder.

Today, on November 15, it is 40 days after Anna Politkovskaya, observer of the "Novaya Gazeta," who became known for her reports from Chechnya, was shot dead in Moscow.

After dissolving the Petrozavodsk City Council, head of Karelia Sergey Katanandov dismissed a number of high-ranked bureaucrats of the Republic's government. Alexander Smirnov, Mr. Katanandov's press secretary explained that "the tough personnel decisions were made by Karelian leader during his interim summing up the measures intended tom overcome the crisis situation in Kondopoga."