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Today at night, Agil Halil, correspondent of the Azadlyg" newspaper, left Azerbaijan for France under a private invitation of the organization "Reporters without Borders". It was Halil's fifth attempt to do so.

On July 24, the Moscow City Court held a preliminary hearing on the case of "Ryno-Skachevskiy grouping", accused of nationalism-motivated murders and attacks, including on Caucasian natives. According to Anna Usachova, head of the press service of Moscow City Court, the trial will pass with participation of jurymen.

On July 23 in Gudermes, OMON (Special Militia) fighters of the Chechen MIA beat and detained several dozens of women who gathered at the countryside residence of Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov with intent to ask him for help.

The Prosecutor's Office of Chechnya has delivered a criminal case to the court against three Chechen militiamen accused of illegal detention and beating of their colleague from interior forces - an employee of the Republic's OMON (Special Militia Unit).

On July 23, the Yasamal District Court of Baku, presided by Judge Khagani Tagiev, continued considering the claim lodged by Agil Halil, journalist of the "Azadlyg" (Freedom) newspaper against TV Channels AZTV, Space, ATV, Lider, and against inspector of State Office of Public Prosecutor Ali Guliev. The TV Channels deny their guilt.

The Committee in Defence of Political Prisoners and Repressed Persons has voiced its protest against refusal of Armenian authorities to apply early release to Armand Babadzhanyan, editor-in-chief of the "Zhamanak-Yerevan" newspaper.

Yerevan Mayoralty refused to sanction the rally of the Nationwide Movement of Armenia planned for August 1 in the Freedom Square near Matenadaran. At the same, as Levon Zurabyan, representative of the Nationwide Movement Centre, told journalists at today's press conference, the Mayoralty tried "to start bargaining with the opposition."

Armenian Ombudsman Armen Arutyunyan receives complaints, where applicants report that in connection with the criminal cases opened on the events on March 1-2 the law enforcement bodies are applying physical and psychological violence with an attempt to get evidences from certain citizens against others.

On July 22, the session of the temporary parliamentary commission set up to investigate the events on March 1-2 in Yerevan listened to the invited official of the Special Investigatory Service, Inspector for Especially Important Cases Vaagn Arutyunyan, who stated that so far the inquiry thinks it unreasonable to change the freedom restriction terms (arrest) to the detained deputies of the National Assembly of Armenia.

Georgia has released two citizens of South Ossetia, detained on July 20 at the police post in the Georgian-Ossetian conflict zone. Soslan Siukaev and Alikhan Khubaev were set free on bail of 4000 laris (3000 US dollars).

According to the "Interfax", Sochi Mayor Vladimir Afanasenkov has explained that under preparation for the 2014 Olympiad, specialists were instructed to draw up a cadastre of the land plots belonging to the residents of the Imereti Valley. Residents of one of the houses situated in the Imereti Valley and planned for demolition to give room for Olympic objects did not let the appraisers to make cadastral measurements.

Today at a court session, Masrurdzhon Yatimov, accused of murdering Russian journalist Ilyas Shurpaev, a native of Dagestan, has admitted his guilt of robbery and deliberate destruction of property, but not of murder.

Today, the Supreme Court of Karelia has announced the indictment on the criminal case about the fight in the Karelian city of Kondopoga on August 30, 2006, which resulted in mass disorders. The defendants, natives of Chechnya and Dagestan, refused to plead guilty.

In the first 6 months of 2008, the Prosecutor's Office of the Rostov Region revealed and registered 2109 crimes not registered before. Out of the total number of such crimes, in 953 cases initiation of criminal cases was unreasonably rejected.

Former Deputy Head of the Armenian State Department of National Security Gurgen Egiazaryan has stated at a meeting with journalists that, most likely, he is at large for two reasons: because of the sit-in protest action in the Severny Avenue and the position of principle proclaimed by Thomas Hammarberg, High Commissioner of the Council of Europe for Human Rights.

Andranik Mirzoyan, head of the Special Investigatory Service of the Republic of Armenia, has answered the letter of Ombudsman Armen Arutyunyan with a number of questions related to the investigatory assignment sent on March 5 to the Prosecutor's Office of the Vaiots Dzor Region (Marz).

According to Shota Khizanishvili, head of the PR Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) of Georgia, the Georgian party is not going to release the two citizens of South Ossetia detained on July 20.

The law enforcement bodies of Ingushetia are investigating an incident in the city of Karabulak, where at night on July 22 unidentified persons got into the territory of the LLC "RIPSU" and shot dead point-blank the workers who were in the glass shop premise. Idris Izmailov, 21, and Karen Arutyunyan, born in 1979, perished.

On July 22, Azerbaijan celebrates the Day of National Press. Exactly 133 years ago, on July 22, 1875, the first issue of the first newspaper in the Azerbaijan language named "Ekinchi" (Ploughman) was published by the outstanding Azerbaijani educator Gasan Bek Zardabi. The Day of National Press is marked since gaining independence by Azerbaijan in 1991.

In the city of Zhirnovsk, Volgograd Region, 16 persons, including a child of nine, have been hospitalized with food poisoning.