Heads of Ingush and Chechen border districts agree to work on Fortanga

The heads of the Sunzha District of Ingushetia and the Sernovodsky District of Chechnya have agreed that the Chechen party will coordinate any works on the bank of the Fortanga River with the administration of the neighbouring district of Ingushetia.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on November 11, Chechnya carried out some excavation work on its bank of the Fortanga River, along which the border with Ingushetia passes; and this angered residents of the neighbouring republic. The new round of tensions on the border may be partly related to the approaching verdict in the case of the leaders of the Ingush protests, analysts have noted.

The Kremlin will not allow any escalation of the Ingush-Chechen conflict, but such incidents could awaken the "sleeping protest" in Ingushetia, Ruslan Kutaev, the head of the Assembly of Caucasian Nations, and Alexei Malashenko, a political analyst, believe.

The performers of the works initiated by the Chechen party do not refuse to return the Fortanga River to its former bed, said Beslan Tsechoev, a deputy head of the Sunzha District of Ingushetia. As for the Fortanga bed, in his opinion, nothing irreversible is happening.

Let us remind you that Magomed Evloev, the Minister of Natural Resources of Ingushetia, has called the actions of Chechen workers on Fortanga illegal; and Ingush authorities notified Moscow about it.