News

December 17, 2014 05:15

• AI announces journalist Khadija Ismayilova to be "prisoner of conscience"

  The human rights organization "Amnesty International" (AI) said that the journalist Khadija Ismayilova was arrested in Azerbaijan for political reasons and recognized her as a "prisoner of conscience".

December 17, 2014 01:55

• In Moscow, participants of Journalists' Memorial Day paid tribute to Akhmednabiyev and Kuashev

  Moscow has hosted the Memorial Day of Journalists who perished while performing their professional duties; and its participants commemorated their colleagues assassinated in Dagestan and Kabardino-Balkaria.

December 17, 2014 01:16

• Special agents fix data of picketers in Moscow in defence of Chechen rights defenders

  A series of solo pickets in support of the Joint Mobile Group (JMG) of rights defenders and the Committee against Torture (CaT) in Chechnya was held on December 16 in Moscow without detentions; however, agents of the FSO (Russia's Federal Security Service) and FSB fixed the personal data of the activists who took part in the action.

December 16, 2014 23:54

• In Armenia, rights defenders state prisons are overcrowded

  Armenian rights defenders name overcrowded prisons, poor quality of medical care in them and problems with conditional early relief (CER) among main problems of the country's penitentiary system.

December 16, 2014 22:58

• Broadcasting of radio "Echo Moskvy-Makhachkala" resumed in Dagestan

  The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on December 11, at the demand of the Russian "Roskomnadzor", the radio "Echo Moskvy-Makhachkala" was suspended. As stated by the spokesman of the "Roskomnadzor", the broadcasting was suspended, because the transmitter was broadcasting not from the place, which is specified in the permit for using radio frequencies.

December 16, 2014 22:20

• Experts doubt about reduced tension in Dagestan after murder of Murad Zalitinov

  In the opinion of Mairbek Agaev and Milrad Fatullaev, the heads of the weekly "Chernovik" and the newspaper "Nastoyascheye Vremya", respectively, the murder Murad Zalitinov will not have a noticeable effect on the situation in the Dagestan armed underground and will not reduce the level of tension in the republic.

December 16, 2014 21:24

• Chechen leader rejects social payments to militants' relatives

  Social packages will be no longer paid out to militants' relatives, the head of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov has stated, again pointing out that his republic will enforce the collective responsibility of families for actions of militants.

December 16, 2014 18:44

• Jundallah Shishani killed in Syria was a native of Georgia

  The field commander of Syrian militants Jundallah Shishani, whose death in the city of Cobani became known on December 8, originated from the same village in the Georgia's Pankisi Gorge as the commander of the northern sector of the "Islamic State" (IS) Tarkhan Batirashvili, also known as Omar Shishani.

December 16, 2014 18:29

• Dagestani special commission finds 52 houses in Vremenny unfit for residence

  In the Dagestani settlement of Vremenny, the special commission set up for assessing the damage made a repeated visit and found 52 houses unfit for living and subject to demolition. Residents of the settlement state large-scale destructions, looting and non-payment of compensations.

December 16, 2014 16:19

• Lawyers of JMG in Chechnya ask power agents to check incidents around their office

  The lawyers of the Joint Mobile Group (JMG) of rights defenders, working in Chechnya, have appealed to law enforcement bodies asking them to conduct a check the fact of visit to their office of three men and the subsequent fire in the premises, as well as the fact of persecuting them by men in masks on December 13.

December 16, 2014 14:24

• In Gudermes, locals report destruction of two houses of militants' families

  Residents of the city of Gudermes have reported the destruction, within the past two days, of two private houses inhabited by relatives of the militants killed during the attack on Grozny on December 4. According to journalist Elena Milashina, families with young children are now homeless.

December 16, 2014 14:07

• In Khasavyurt, buildings of city and district administrations are blocked by power agents

  According to preliminary information, law enforcers are conducting confiscation of documents relating to allocation of land plots in Khasavyurt and in the Khasavyurt District, the RIA "Dagestan" reports.

December 16, 2014 12:59

• Arson and wiring short circuit are versions of fire in rights defenders' office in Grozny

  Construction workers are repairing the facade of the house in Grozny, which houses the burnt-out office of the Joint Mobile Group (JMG) of rights defenders. Local observers do not rule out that the fire in the office could be committed by people dissatisfied with their work.

December 16, 2014 12:34

• RWB: the only journalist murdered in Russia in 2014 was Timur Kuashev

  The international human rights organization "Reporters Without Borders" (RWB) has published a report about the journalists, killed, kidnapped and jailed in 2014. Timur Kuashev, journalist and rights defender from Kabardino-Balkaria, is named as the only Russian reporter killed for professional reasons.

December 16, 2014 10:19

• Journalist from Nalchik Tsagoev is laureate of Sakharov Award

  This year, Igor Tsagoev, a journalist from Nalchik, has been awarded the Andrei Sakharov Prize "For Journalism as a Deed". The list of finalists comprised journalists from Volgograd and Makhachkala.

December 16, 2014 04:09

• Body of Magomed Kamalov, killed in Kayakent District of Dagestan, was not given out to relatives

  The family of Magomed Kamalov, a resident of Izberbash, who was killed on December 12 in the Kayakent District of Dagestan, has not yet received his body for burial, said one of Kamalov's relatives. The GOVD (City Interior Division) of Izberbash has clarified that the casualty was not on the wanted list.

December 15, 2014 19:24

• Kalyapin accuses Chechen rights defenders of escalating situation around Committee against Torture

  Prior to the fire in the office, some Chechen rights defenders had been deliberately spreading false information about the activities of the Committee against Torture (CaT) and inflating the situation, said Igor Kalyapin, the head of the CaT.

December 15, 2014 18:32

• Missing resident of Dagestan identified by relatives among shootout casualties

  Relatives of Pakhrudin Magomedov, a missing resident of the Dagestani village of Tyube, have found his body in the morgue of the city of Kizilyurt, the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial" has reported.

December 15, 2014 17:58

• FSB confirms death of "Imarat Kavkaz" leader in Dagestan

  Murad Zalitinov, a former head of the Kadar unit of "Imarat Kavkaz", was killed on December 12 in a special operation in Dagestan, said the press service of the Russian FSB.

December 15, 2014 16:24

• Azerbaijan completes preliminary investigation on rights defender Djafarov

  The preliminary investigation into the criminal case of Rasul Djafarov, the coordinator of the campaign "Arts for Democracy", is over in Azerbaijan. After the rights defender gets acquainted with the indictment, the case will go to the Baku Court of Grave Crimes.