--CONTROVERSIAL BOOK IS CONFISCATED The FSB and Moscow police have confiscated several thousand copies of Aleksandr Litvinenko's book, "The FSB Explodes Russia," according to Aleksandr Podrabinek, editor in chief of the Prima information agency. Podrabinek told the radio station Ekho Moskvy that his agency had... MORE

--ATTACKS INCREASING IN CHECHNYA? Contrary to the image of "normalization" projected by the Kremlin, the number of rebel attacks in Chechnya classified by the Kadyrov administration as "terrorist" rose by more than 50 percent from 2002 to 2003. In the year just ended the total... MORE

--SECURITY SWEEP LEADS TO BLOODSHED Police of the Kadyrov administration came under rebel gunfire last weekend as they conducted a "zachistka" security sweep in eastern Chechnya's Kurchaloy district. An administration official told the Associated Press that one policeman was killed and two wounded in the... MORE

—POPOV TO RUN FOR GOVERNOR? A new job outside Chechnya may have been lined up for Anatoly Popov, now clearly on his way out as the Kadyrov administration’s prime minister (see Chechnya Weekly, January 14). According to a February 11 article in Moskovskie novosti, Popov... MORE

--LIMITED RETURN FOR OSCE TO CHECHNYA The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe may be about to reopen its office in Chechnya--but will have difficulty reviving its human rights monitoring. In a joint press conference in Moscow on February 17, Russian Foreign Minister Igor... MORE

--KICKBACKS TO KADYROV Requesting anonymity, several members of the Kadyrov administration's police have told Timur Aliev of Prague Watchdog that they have to pay substantial kickbacks to Ramzan Kadyrov, head of his father's private army. Aliev wrote in a March 3 article that such payments... MORE

--KIDNAPPINGS ARE HIGHLIGHTED From the beginning of January through mid-March at least sixty-three Chechen civilians have been kidnapped, according to the Moscow-based human rights center Memorial. Of that total, twenty-six have since been released and two have been found dead. The fate of another thirty-five... MORE

--GENERAL ADMITS CONTINUING DIFFICULTIES Less than two weeks after Putin's triumphant reelection, a key Russian general in effect admitted that the military situation in Chechnya is not nearly as hopeful as the Russian electorate has been told. General Vyacheslav Tikhomirov, head of the internal forces... MORE

--STUDY HIGHLIGHTS ETHNIC PREJUDICES A Russian citizen who specializes in studying the country's ethnic minorities has found disturbing new evidence of ethnic-Russian chauvinism even in the country's mainstream news media. Suliyeta Kusova, head of the Association on Ethnic Problems, found that crossword puzzles in the... MORE

--REBELS ARMS THEMSELVES An April 15 report by Umalt Dudayev for the London-based Institute for War and Peace Reporting (website www.iwpr.net ) shed light on the use of cheap, homemade but nevertheless highly deadly weapons by the rebel guerrillas in Chechnya. Dudayev concluded that “even... MORE