The November 5 issue of the German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung carried an article by German specialist Aleksandr Rahr (who is of Russian descent) which was translated into Russian and posted on the website Inosmi.ru on the same day. The author commented inter alia: "Putin has... MORE

According to a report appearing in the November 5 issue of the Prague Watchdog, on October 25, four camps for Chechen IDPs located on the territory of Ingushetia--the Satsita, Bela, Alina and Sputnik camps--"were encircled by a large number of Russian soldiers. Federal servicemen started... MORE

On November 7, it was announced that President Putin had issued a decree appointing Stanislav Il'yasov, the prime minister of the pro-Moscow Chechen government, minister of the Russian Federation for the affairs of Chechnya (RIA Novosti and Lenta.ru, November 7). Il'yasov's promotion seems to represent... MORE

The November 6 issue of the website Politcom.ru reported that, five days previously, on November 1, agents of the FSB had raided the editorial offices of the weekly newspaper Versiya. They came to "seize the computer of one of the journalists and to take away... MORE

On November 3, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov told journalists at Khabarovsk airport in the Russian Far East that the Russian military force based in Chechnya had begun a massive, violent retaliatory operation against Chechen militants. Ivanov also announced that he personally had taken a decision... MORE

:* Putin slams TV channel coverage* The Dano-Russo sticking point* Closing the Inguish camps* Whither the refugees?* On being a Chechen in Moscow* Perspective: Self-deportation to Kazakhstan? NEWS

In the aftermath of the storming of the Moscow theater at Dubrovka on October 26, Russian authorities commenced a crackdown against two television channels whose coverage of the hostage crisis had evidently deeply angered the Kremlin. "The president [Putin] himself," the website Politcom.ru reported on... MORE

The strain in relations between Russia and Denmark continued over the past several weeks. Russia maintained heavy pressure on Denmark to extradite separatist deputy premier Akhmed Zakaev, who had come to the country to participate in a conference and had then been arrested on October... MORE

On November 27, Russian authorities announced that they intended, by the end of December, to close the "tent cities" located in Ingushetia that now house tens of thousands of Chechen IDPs. (Reuters, November 27). On the same day, Poul Nielson, head of the European Commission's... MORE