Magomed Mutsolgov, head of the Ingush human rights group Mashr, claimed in an interview with Sobkor.ru website published on October 3 that the Federal Security Service (FSB) has essentially taken control of the local law-enforcement bodies in Ingushetia. By way of evidence for his claim,... MORE

Two police officers were killed in the town of Dagestanskiye Ogni in southern Dagestan, RIA Novosti reported on October 3. “A criminal fired from an assault rifle at a Lada car parked outside of the town’s interior department in Ulitsa Lenina on October 2,” a... MORE

The continuing rebel attacks in Ingushetia are forcing the Russian authorities to look for new ways to pacify the region. Russian officials repeatedly vowed over the past summer that the situation in Ingushetia would soon be normalized, but the only thing that has changed since... MORE

Russian news agencies reported on September 22 that Shamil Buraev, the former head of Chechnya’s Achkhoi-Martan district who was arrested on September 13 and accused of organizing the contract killing of Anna Politkovskaya (Chechnya Weekly, September 20) has been formally charged with complicity in the... MORE

The Chechen Ministry of Culture on September 24 published a list of rules that local artists will have to follow in order to receive permission to perform. From now on, only artists whose repertoires “respond to the demands of artistic taste, and also the norms... MORE

Newsru.com reported on September 25 that the Chechen parliament had filed a lawsuit against Garry Kasparov, the former chess champion and leader of the opposition United Civil Front, for putatively inflicting “moral damage” on Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov - in particular for “slander” and “insult.”... MORE

Unidentified gunmen fired on an armored personnel carrier ferrying Interior Ministry Internal Troops between the settlements of Galashki and Alkhasti in Ingushetia’s Sunzha district on September 26. An Ingush law-enforcement source told Kavkazky Uzel that attackers apparently fired from automatic weapons and grenade launchers. “As... MORE

The more unstable the North Caucasus becomes, the more discussions take place in Russia about why it is happening and why people are taking up arms and fighting. Observers particularly focus on Dagestan, the biggest Caucasian region and the most complicated one due to its... MORE

On September 19, security forces in Nazran, Ingushetia, clashed with demonstrators protesting the kidnapping of two brothers, reportedly by Federal Security Service (FSB) personnel. Usam Baisaev of the Memorial Human Right Center office in Nazran told Ekho Moskvy radio that the protestors were inhabitants of... MORE

The North Ossetian jamaat is undoubtedly the most exotic of all the North Caucasus resistance units. For the longest time this group was considered a fable, a fabrication used by ethnic Ingush for propagandistic purposes. Just a year ago, Aslanbek Kelekhsaev, the secretary of the... MORE