The Month in Brief - October 2006October 3-4
Two platoons comprising over fifty servicemen from the Chechen battalions East and West were sent to Lebanon to protect there Russian engineering troops reconstructing bridges destroyed during the recent conflict with Israel.
October 4
UN Special Rapporteur on Torture Manfred Novak postponed his planned visit to Russia, including Chechnya, because Russian authorities were not ready to allow him to make unannounced visits to detention centers and to hold private interviews with detainees.
October 5
Celebrations marking the 30th birthday of the Kremlin-backed Chechen Premier Ramzan Kadyrov took place in Chechnya. The age of 30 makes Kadyrov eligible to become President of the Chechen Republic.
The renovated Severny airport in Grozny was officially opened and the first civilian aircraft landed there.
October 7
Investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who covered the conflict in Chechnya and developments in the Northern Caucasus, was shot dead in Moscow.
Public celebrations marking the 54th birthday of Russian President Vladimir Putin took place in Grozny.
October 10
Slain journalist Anna Politkovskaya was buried at the Troyekurovskoye cemetery in Moscow.
October 11
Referring to a report by the Russian-Chechen Information Agency, Kavkazsky uzel reported that Rita Ersenoyeva, the mother of the abducted Chechen journalist Elina Ersenoyeva had recently been kidnapped as well.
October 12
The European Court of Human Rights announced that it had held Russia responsible for the summary execution of five members of the Estamirov family in Chechnya in February 2000.
October 13
The Nizhny Novgorod regional court dismantled the NGO Russian-Chechen Society Friendship (ORChD). ORChD head Stanislav Dmitriyevsky said the organization would appeal the verdict.
Residents of the Kabardino-Balkarian capital of Nalchik commemorated the events that took place one year ago when mostly local young men carried out armed raids on law enforcement agencies, which resulted in dozens of casualties.
October 14
A Chechen branch of the political party "Russian Party of Life" was established in Grozny. Muslim Khuchiyev, the first deputy head of the administration of the Moscow-backed Chechen president and premier, became its chairman.
October 16
In Nazran, police dispersed a picket organized by Ingush NGO Mashr to honour slain Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Rallies in honour of Politkovskaya took place also in other towns in Russia and abroad.
October 17
Chechen businessman Khussein Jabrailov became Vice-Premier of the Moscow-backed Chechen government in charge of issues concerning industry, economy and energy.
October 19
The average subsistence level in Chechnya reached 3,011 roubles in the second quarter of 2006, up from 3,006 roubles in Q1 2006, stated Chechen Labour and Social Development Minister Magomed Vakhayev.
October 20
Akhmed-Beshir Elmurzayev, a high-ranking official of the Chechen Interior Ministry, was approved by the Parliament of the Chechen Republic as chairman of the Chechen Constitutional Court.
October 21
During her visit to Moscow US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met with the son of Anna Politkovskaya and with representatives of the Novaya gazeta newspaper, where the slain Russian journalist worked.
October 24
Acting upon the request from the Russian bureau of Interpol, Swedish police arrested former Chechen guerrilla Magomed Uspayev, whom the Russian authorities accuse of participating in an abduction of a Russian journalist in 1999. Uspayev claimed that he is a cousin of the late President of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria Aslan Maskhadov.
October 25
Russian daily Kommersant wrote that the investigators who look into the October 7 murder of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya visited the Russian city of Nizhnevartovsk in the West Siberian province of Khanty-Mansiysky Okrug. Politkovskaya earlier reported about crimes committed by several Nizhnevartovsk policemen in Chechnya, after which one of the policemen was imprisoned and others put on the wanted list.
October 26
In Moscow several hundred people rallied in front of the Dubrovka theater center to commemorate the victims of the siege that took place there four years ago.
The introduction of jury trials in Chechnya might be postponed from 2007 to 2010, stated Valery Zorkin, chairman of Russia's Constitutional Court, citing an above-average percentage of "not guilty" verdicts in the neighbouring Caucasian republics.
October 28
Local authorities organized a "public forum" in the Daghestani town of Khasavyurt, located near the border with Chechnya, in protest against abductions carried out by Chechen law enforcers in the territory of Daghestan, Gazeta.ru reported.
October 31
In Grozny the Moscow-backed Chechen authorities organized the Congress of the Peoples of the Chechen Republic, in which representatives of the peoples who live or used to live in Chechnya took part.
Compiled by Prague Watchdog. Along with these monthly summaries, we also publish weekly summaries, distributing them on Mondays to the subscribers of our free weekly newsletter. (T,A)
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