Kavkazky Uzel reported on May 14 that more than 1,000 people blocked a highway in Dagestan's Kizlyar district to demand the release of Magomed and Gazimagomed Gairbekov brothers. The two were arrested on suspicion of having carried out the February 16 bombing in the center... MORE

Security forces and police in Karachaevo-Cherkessia carried out a special operation on May 14 against suspected militants who were holed up in an apartment building in Cherkessk, the republic's capital. According to the FSB, six militants were killed in the operation. The Associated Press quoted... MORE

The Caucasus Times reported on May 16 that residents of the village of Khasanya in Kabardino-Balkaria were prevented from holding a protest in the republic's capital, Nalchik, to protest the killing of the head of their village's administration, Artur Zokaev. According to the publication's website,... MORE

The trial of the sole survivor of the September 2004 attack on the school in Beslan, North Ossetia, Nur-Pashi Kulaev, got underway in the North Ossetian capital of Vladikavkaz on May 17, but was suspended by the judge until May 19 after distraught relatives of... MORE

Since the beginning of April, Ramzan Kadyrov's units have sharply increased the number of military actions in neighboring Daghestan, particularly on the territory of the Hasavyurt district – populated predominantly by Chechens and Avars. These actions followed public statements by Kadyrov that Chechen warlord Shamil... MORE

Thousands of people gathered in the Chechen capital Friday of Grozny on May 20 to protest the acquittal of GRU Captain Eduard Ulman and three subordinates on charges of murdering six Chechen civilians in January 2002. According to Agence France-Presse, some 3,000 people, including young... MORE

Dagestan's minister of nationalities, information and external affairs, Zagir Arukhov, was killed by an explosion in his apartment building in Makhachkala on May 20 after arriving home from work. RIA Novosti reported on May 21 that his bodyguard, Serif Minafov, was badly wounded in the... MORE

The International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF) on May 19 issued a report "Impunity: A Leading Force behind Continued Massive Violations in Chechnya." The report, which was posted on the Vienna-based group's website (ihf-hr.org), stated that despite claims by Chechen and Russian Federation officials... MORE

A group of Russian human rights activists signed an open letter calling for negotiations with the Chechen rebels. "The Russian authorities, by way of resolving the Chechen crisis, have for several years now been suggesting only a combination of punitive military operations, direct terror by... MORE

Meanwhile, Akhmed Zakaev, the London-based Chechen separatist special representative, told the Chechenpress website on May 19 that "the right way of approaching peace in Chechnya is to expand resistance to the occupying forces." "Praise be to the Almighty, Russia will have to pay for the... MORE