All news

The border with Georgia will be closed from December 30 to January 2 due to the increased security measures during the New Year holidays, the South Ossetian KGB (Committee for State Security) has announced.

Most Azerbaijani jails were built in Soviet times and fail to meet modern standards. The rights of arrested and convicted persons are violated. Corruption, administration arbitrariness and torture are common in penitentiary institutions, the Centre for the Protection of Political Prisoners (CPPP) has stated.

Additional checks of natives of Northern Caucasus at the border are a common practice for Russian law enforcers, who are guided by subjective perceptions of suspicious individuals. This was stated by human rights defenders and lawyers after the detention of Khabib Nurmagomedov.

The court has found a member of the Jehovah's Witnesses (an organization recognized as extremist and banned in Russia) from the city of Prokhladny guilty of extremism and sentenced him to 120 hours of compulsory work.

Traditional relations in Dagestan are undermined much more than in Ingushetia and Chechnya, the researchers have stated. They have studied the commitment to traditional values among Ingushes and Chechens.

On Thursday, December 27, the workers of the companies, engaged in building the North-South motor transport corridor, blocked the road to Yerevan in the Aragatsotn Region of Armenia for four hours.

On December 25, the "International Circassian Organization" sent a letter to Russian President Vladimir Putin with a request to include compatriots from Syria living in Russia in the category of people eligible for simplified obtaining of citizenship.

Blogger Mekhman Guseinov, suspected of beating a penal colony warder two months before the release, has been transferred to a punishment cell. He has refused to testify and went on a hunger strike, relatives and friends of the prisoner report. An advocate of Mekhman Guseinov complained that she was not allowed to visit the defendant.

Participants of the AniDag anime festival, which was not held in November because of threats, demanded from the Dagestani law enforcement bodies to investigate a criminal case on incitement of hostility. 

Employees of budget-funded institutions have to participate in raising money for New Year's gifts for children in the framework of the action organized by a Ramzan Kadyrov's daughter, report residents of Grozny. 

The removal of clitoris is not on the list of allowed medical services; and such surgeries on girls contain signs of a criminal offense. This was declared by the "Roszdravnadzor" (the Russian Federal Service for Surveillance in Healthcare) after checking a Moscow clinic where female circumcision was performed.

On December 26, an elderly Azerbaijani woman was wounded during shelling of a border village. Doctors helped her, the Agdam district authorities have stated.

A court in Baku has dismissed the defence's petition to transfer Azad Gasanov, an activist of the "Musavat" Party, to house arrest. The defence claims a violation of Gasanov's right to meet and talk by phone with his family members.

The refusal to come to the republic's Kadiate undermines the Alims' authority, Malsag Uzhakhov, the chairman of the Ingush Council of Teips, has stated. A refusal to resolve disputes as befits a Muslim, is moving such people are moving away from the society, Magomed Mutsolgov, a human rights defender, believes.

Mekhman Guseinov, convicted in Azerbaijan on charges of libel against policemen, was suspected of beating up a colony employee. They want to prevent the regime's critic from being released, rights defenders believe.

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) has accused the authorities of Azerbaijan of violating the truce, and urged to refrain from aggravating the conflict during the holidays.

The solution of the problem of the boy from Grozny, who has addressed Ramzan Kadyrov, was a typical Kadyrov's promotion action like those undertaken by Vladimir Putin. Kadyrov is manipulating the opinion of residents of Chechnya, by demonstrating polar reactions to people's appeals, rights defenders assert.

Law enforcers have strengthened security measures in Grozny before the New Year holidays, and on December 25, conducted passport checks, local residents have reported. The law enforcement bodies treat them as prophylactic measures.

The actions of law enforcers during the pickets in defence of the LGBT movement in Volgograd should be assessed by investigators, the Prosecutor's Office and the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA), said Alexei Nazarov, an activist.

Khabib Nurmagomedov, an MMA fighter from Dagestan, was questioned at Makhachkala Airport before flying to Turkey. Border guards suspected him of trying to join the "Islamic State" (IS), a terrorist organization, banned in Russia by the court.