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Ilkham Aliyev issued two decrees on September 3. By one of them he granted a pardon to Alikram Gumbatov, the leader of the self-proclaimed Talish-Mugan Republic who led a revolt in the south of Azerbaijan and was sentenced to life imprisonment then. By the other decree the President revoked Gumbatov's Azerbaijan citizenship.

According to information spread by the Regional Operations Headquarters on September 4, Maskhadov, Basayev and other field commanders planned to commit terror attacks against their close relatives and then put the blame on Russian servicemen.

Approximately 340 wounded people have been taken to hospitals in Beslan and Vladikavkaz after the storm of the school captured by rebels in Beslan, reported the North Osetian Health Minister.

A group of gunmen in masks and camouflage uniforms broke into the house on Kochubeya Street and took Fatima Gaziyeva and her husband away in an unknown direction without any explanations.

The Human Rights Protection Department of the Institute of Peace and Democracy is deeply concerned with the situation around the witnesses who refused from their testimonies and declared about the tortures.

We call your attention to the statement issued by the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF) and the Moscow Helsinki Group (MHG) on September 2, 2004.

So far the rebels have rejected suggestions to provide the hostages with water, food and medicines and exchange a group of hostages.

About 400 students, parents, and teachers are reported to be among the hostages in the school captured by rebels in North Osetia.

The capacity of the explosive device that went off near the Rizhskaya station is preliminary estimated at about 2 kilograms of trotyl equivalent with damaging elements, the public relations center of the Federal Security Service has reported.

A representative of one of the candidates who lost believes "it is a useless occupation in any case."

The tender is announced within the framework of the Humanitarian Aid to Nagorny Karabakh program financed by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

"The next year is declared the year of Russian in the republic, but Azerbaijan is carrying out a discrimination reform of the education system," members of the Association of Teachers of Russian in Azerbaijan Schools said.

An explosion took place when a Russian military convoy was moving in the Achkhoy-Martan district of Chechnya on August 30.

The International Helsinki Federation, the Moscow Helsinki Group, and the "Caucasian Knot" Media will hold the "Presidential Election in Chechnya 2004 — New and Improved" press-conference in the Independent Press Center, Moscow, on September 1, 2004.

We call your attention to the statement issued by the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF) and the Moscow Helsinki Group (MHG) on August 30, 2004.

"I've brought up my children here and I don't want to go back to Chechnya and jeopardize their life," one of the refugees living in the Pankissi Gorge said.

The main problem of precinct election commissions (PECs) was a low turnout in the August 29 presidential election. But PEC officials made up the lack of voters by the most simple and accessible means. They threw in ballots.

"The winner had been known in advance. People just knew nothing depended on the participation or nonparticipation in this farce," Aydamir Suleymanov, a 47-year-old resident of Grozny, said.

A source in the republican election commission has told the Caucasian Knot correspondent about it. According to commission's information, over 30% of voters have already voted in the presidential election.

Election staff of Movsur Khamidov, who is running for the republican presidency, have told the Caucasian Knot correspondent they registered tampering with voters in the village of Sernovodskaya, Chechnya's Sunzha district.