News about increased military operations against rebels in Chechnya has unexpectedly been coming out of Chechnya over the last two months. What has been unusual about the reporting is that they describe full-scale warfare, which has not taken place in Chechnya since the end of... MORE

On July 18, the Russian air force launched a surprise massive military exercise in Kabardino-Balkaria. Fifteen military aircraft are taking part in the exercises, including Su-24, Su-25, Su-27, Su-34, MIG-29 and Tu-22M3 planes, and Mi-24 and Mi-28 helicopters. These are the largest maneuvers in Kabardino-Balkaria... MORE

On July 15 Russian investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin stated that the militant group under the command of Islam Uspakhadzhiev (aka the Shalazhi Jamaat, after the village of Shalazhi in Chechnya’s Urus Martan district) was behind the murder two years ago of the well-known Chechen... MORE

Insurgency-related violence was reported in Dagestan, Chechnya and Ingushetia this past week. Unidentified attackers shot and killed an inspector with the West Caspian water resources protection service in Dagestan yesterday (July 14). In the incident, which took place in the village of Nechaevka in the republic’s... MORE

Georgian media-freedom watchdogs, criticizing the espionage investigation against three local photographers (“Three Photographers Charged With Espionage In Georgia,” EDM, July 14), have crossed the line beyond their own mandate. This group now seeks publication of the classified evidence and an “independent review” of the case... MORE

Georgia’s official presidential photographer, another photographer who is an Internal Affairs Ministry contract employee, and the Tbilisi representative of the European Pressphoto Agency (EPA), are in pre-trial detention since July 7 on charges of espionage. On July 9 the Internal Affairs Ministry briefed the media... MORE

The Russian government is still looking for the ways to solve the armed resistance problem in the North Caucasus. The government, however, makes no attempt to understand the core issues of the region, seeking instead a quick fix using administrative methods and force. This time,... MORE

On July 6, the Kavkazsky Uzel (Caucasian Knot) website reported new cases of arson attacks against relatives of suspected rebels in Chechnya. The website quoted sources in the Shali, Kurchaloi and Gudermes districts (who were not named for security reasons) as saying that that up... MORE

President Alyaksandr Lukashenka is “caught in a vice, which will only continue to tighten,” between democratically motivated Western pressures and Russia’s “interest in acquiring attractive Belarusian assets from a vulnerable Lukashenka,” according to David Kramer and Wess Mitchell (www.charter97.org, July 9). If so, Western sanctions... MORE

On July 6, a massive anti-government protest took place in the town of Baksan, Kabardino-Balkaria. An estimated 600 unarmed young men blocked a vital highway connecting the capital of the republic, Nalchik, with the neighboring Stavropol region. The protesters demanded that the authorities “put an... MORE