On the eve of the Russia-EU summit, October 3, a group of Russian human rights activists testified in Brussels before the European Parliament's sub-committee on human rights. The subject was human rights in Russia, particularly in the North Caucasus. Afterward, one of the participants, Tanya... MORE

On the eve of the Russia-EU summit in London, which took place on October 4, Amnesty International released a report entitled "Torture, ‘Disappearances,' and Alleged Unfair Trials in Russia's North Caucasus." The human rights group states in the report that what the Russian government calls... MORE

The Moscow City Court on September 29 granted a request by the Prosecutor General's office that the pre-trial detention of one of the suspects arrested for the July 2004 murder of Forbes Russia editor-in-chief Paul Klebnikov, Musa Vakhaev, be extended two months—until December 9. According... MORE

In its October 3 issue, Kommersant-Vlast published an in-depth investigation of the Islamist movement in Kabardino-Balkaria. A correspondent for the weekly, Olga Allenova, interviewed Andimirkan Guchaev, a young resident of Kabardino-Balkaria who studied religion in Saudi Arabia and who recently became the unofficial head of... MORE

There are some questions that some nations avoid asking themselves just because they subconsciously know the answers. For a clearly articulated answer could become destructive for the state and therefore we shall never hear it. And that is correct. The question that I am going... MORE

Rebels in Kabardino-Balkaria on October 13 tried to seize all of the buildings of the republic's power structures in the capital, Nalchik. The attack was carried out by a large group of what the authorities called "religious extremist-Wahhabis." According to official estimates, 150-300 rebels were... MORE

Two Dagestani police officers were killed on the evening of October 10 in a gun battle with a group of rebels, the Regnum information agency reported. The shootout took place near the village of Gimry after members of various police and Dagestani Interior Ministry units... MORE

A Ural car carrying Ingushetian Interior Ministry Internal Troops was blown up on the Kavkaz federal highway in the Gamurzievsky municipal district of the city of Nazran on October 11, Kavkazky Uzel reported. One of the servicemen was lightly injured. According to specialists, the blast... MORE

A jury in Rostov-on-Don last week upheld a June 2004 court decision acquitting two Russian Interior Ministry officers, Yevgeny Khudyakov and Sergei Arakcheyev, who were accused of murdering three Chechens in January 2003. As Novaya gazeta noted on October 10, the incident took place on... MORE

Kavkazky Uzel on October 10 quoted the former commander of the federal Interior Ministry's Internal Troops, Gen.-Col. Anatoly Shkirko, as saying that the number of rebels fighting federal forces in Chechnya is far higher than the estimates given by officials. "Who carried out evening formation... MORE