Anna Politkovskaya, the Novaya gazeta correspondent who has written many fearless reports from Chechnya, was poisoned under suspicious circumstances while on her way to cover the hostage crisis in Beslan. The episode inevitably recalls the mysterious death of her colleague, the newspaper's deputy editor Yuri... MORE

Along with Anna Politkovskaya, one of the journalists reporting on Chechnya who is most disliked by the Kremlin is Andrei Babitsky of Radio Liberty. (Four years ago he was seized by mysterious kidnappers, thought widely to be agents of Russia's security services, and released only... MORE

The August 29 special election to fill the vacant presidency of Chechnya's pro-Moscow administration produced no surprises. Despite the authorities' efforts to control the flow of information, independent journalists managed to learn enough to make it clear that a high turnout would have been reported... MORE

With Chechnya's latest rigged election now safely behind them, Kremlin decision-makers will now probably pursue a balancing game in their relations with Grozny's pro-Moscow administration—trying to keep in power both Ramzan Kadyrov and the newly "elected" president Alu Alkhanov. That was the prediction of commentator... MORE

The Putin administration's continually tightening controls over the broadcast media have shielded ordinary Russians from sights and sounds that would undermine the Kremlin's own spin about normalization and pacification in Chechnya. But the Kremlin line is still being challenged in the print media, and not... MORE

Trying to take advantage of the mounting tensions between Georgia and Russia, the head of Chechnya's underground separatist government said in a taped interview broadcast last week on the Georgian TV station "Mze" that Georgia had his full support in the conflict over South Ossetia.... MORE

It was not until Friday, August 27—three days after the crashes of two Russian passenger jets—that the FSB finally acknowledged the likelihood that the tragedy was the result of a terrorist attack. Both planes had taken off from the same Moscow airport, and they crashed... MORE

Last week saw a rare victory for the rule of law in a case involving Russian military atrocities in Chechnya—though it remains to be seen whether that victory will be consolidated. The military branch of the federal Supreme Court nullified April's verdict by a jury... MORE

The renaming of a Moscow street in honor of Akhmad Kadyrov (see Chechnya Weekly, August 25) seems to reveal a double standard on the part of the municipal authorities. Not only does the city have a law forbidding that any street be named after anyone... MORE

As readers will recall from the July 28 issue of Chechnya Weekly, the strongest rival to the Kremlin's preferred candidate in this coming weekend's special election for the presidency of Chechnya's pro-Moscow administration was forced out of the race last month. The election authorities claimed... MORE