CHECHNYA LINKS LIBRARY

The Month in Brief - December 2006

December 1

The number of new HIV/AIDS cases registered in Chechnya reached 140 in the January-November period of this year, compared with 90 cases in the same year-ago period, and the number of people who died of the disease in the period is 23, said Khedi Aydamirova from the republic's anti-AIDS center. Nowadays the total number of HIV positive people in Chechnya is 707 and the total death rate is 73, she added.

As of today there are no conscripts in the Russian Interior Ministry forces in the Northern Caucasus, Interfax-AVN quoted Vasily Panchenkov of the Interior Ministry's press department as saying.

December 2

The Moscow-backed Chechen Premier Ramzan Kadyrov became a member of the General Council of the Unified Russia party during the party's congress in Yekaterinburg.

December 4

The UNHCR will open its office in Grozny in 2007, stated Adam Alkhanov, chairman of the IDP committee of the Moscow-backed Chechen government.

A three-member delegation of Chinese investors arrived in Chechnya for a visit lasting several days.

Grozny-inform reported that Chechen Parliament had passed a bill on the republic's Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Chechen parliamentary speaker Dukvakha Abdurakhmanov said the next congress of the pro-Kremlin party United Russia would take place in Grozny in 2007.

December 4-5

US Ambassador to Russia, Bill Burns, travelled to the North Caucasus, visiting the Kabardino-Balkarian capital of Nalchik as well as the North Ossetian towns of Vladikavkaz and Beslan.

December 5

Chechen Premier Ramzan Kadyrov appointed Akhmad Gekhayev, the Chechen Construction Minister, to head the operating staff for the restoration of Grozny. Gekhayev replaced Shamsadi Dudayev, who had headed the body since its creation one year ago.

December 8

Russia's State Duma postponed the introduction of jury trials in Chechnya from 2007 till 2010.

Fifty servicemen of the Chechen battalions East and West returned from their two-month mission to Lebanon. They were sent there on October 3-4 to protect Russian engineering troops reconstructing bridges destroyed during the recent conflict with Israel.

In Grozny the Moscow-backed Chechen authorities organized a series of events in memory of journalists killed in Chechen wars. Over the last 15 years about 100 journalists, including 22 local ones, have been killed in Chechnya, the authorities said.

December 12

Russian bi-weekly Novaya gazeta became the laureate of the 15th Reporters Without Borders - Fondation de France prize in the „Media“ category. The Paris-based media watchdog Reporters Without Borders said the newspaper carries out investigations exposing corruption in the Russian administration and carried numerous reports on Chechnya by Anna Politkovskaya.

December 13

During their visit to the village of Staroshchedrinskaya in Chechnya's Shelkovsky district, representatives of Russian NGOs Grazhdanskoye sodeystiye and Russian-Chechen Society Friendship discovered that this year there appeared 18 new cases of the mysterious disease which hit the district one year ago.

December 14

Journalist Christoph Wanner of the German radio and television station Deutsche Welle was detained in Grozny. Having confiscated his equipment and videotapes, law enforcers expelled him from Chechnya, although he had all the necessary permissions to work in the so called territory of counter-terrorist operations.

December 15

General Yakov Nedobitko replaced Lieutenant-General Yevgeny Baryayev as commader of Russia's Joint Troops Group in Northern Caucasus.

December 16

About 3,000 people took part in a rally organized by the Other Russia opposition group in central Moscow to protest against the regime of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

December 17

A Chechen parliamentary commission will assess the damage that has been inflicted upon the republic by combat operations since 1994, said Dukvakha Abdurkhmanov, speaker of Chechnya's parliament.

A rally in memory of the journalists who have been killed in Russia over the last 15 years was held in Novopushkinsky Park in central Moscow.

December 18

Dmitry Kozak, Russian presidential envoy in the Southern Federal District, spoke against the idea of a Chechen parliamentary commission to assess the damage that has been inflicted upon Chechnya by combat operations since 1994. He, as well as the Moscow-backed Chechen Premier Ramzan Kadyrov two days later, said that if such assessment was really necessary, it should be made by a federal commission, not by a Chechen parliamentary one.

Moscow's Presnensky Court started considering on the merits of the claim lodged by 41 residents of the Chechen village of Borozdinovskaya against the Russian Defence Ministry over the June 2005 incident, in which one resident was killed and 11 other residents disappeared.

December 19

Nikolai Patrushev, head of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), accused the NGO Danish Refugee Council of espionage it allegedly carries out during its aid operations in the Northern Caucasus. Arnee Vaagen, head of DRC's international department, strongly rejected Patrushev's allegations.

Ramzan Kadyrov, the Moscow-backed Chechen Premier, said his government was going to actively revive tourism in the republic in 2007.

December 21

The Estonian government decided not to grant the country's citizenship „on merit for exceptional achievement to the benefit of the Estonian state“ to Alla Dudayeva, whose late husband Jokhar Dudayev commanded the Soviet strategic air base in Tartu before becoming first Chechen president in 1991, announced Russian news agency Interfax.

December 22

In its final in-depth report on the Beslan siege, the Russian parliamentary commission of inquiry head by Alexander Torshin stated that the initial fatal blast was caused by the terrorists and that security forces only used heavy weapons when there were no hostages in the building any more. However, the victims' groups rejected the commission's conclusions.

December 25

A security operation against alleged guerrillas was carried out in the center of Cherkessk, the capital of the republic of Karachayevo-Cherkessia. One or two militants were killed and two detained, according to conflicting reports.

December 27

Celebrations marking the official opening of Grozny's thoroughfare, Akhmad Kadyrov Avenue, formerly Lenin Avenue, took place in the center of the city. Reconstruction efforts in the street and adjacent buildings have been quite intensive since the middle of 2006.

DNA tests have confirmed that the remains of the guerrilla killed in the July 10 blast near the Ingushetian village of Ekazhevo do belong to Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev.

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/B)