News

October 20, 2003 14:30

• Urgent problems of legal proceedings are discussed in Stavropol region

  The seminar "Urgent Problems of Legal Proceedings on Civil and Criminal Cases" took place in Pyatigorsk on October 16-17.

October 20, 2003 13:00

• Akhmad Kadyrov was sworn in as president of Chechnya

  Akhmad Kadyrov took his oaths of office and swore to serve the peoples of Chechnya and to abide by the constitutions of the Russian Federation and the Chechen Republic.

October 20, 2003 12:37

• U.S. advocate decriminalization of defamation and say failure to grant broadcast licenses to A1+ and Noyan Tapan TV companies is politically driven

  The Bureau of International Information Programs of the U.S. Department of State disseminated the speech of Ronald McNamara made on October 7 at the OSCE Human Dimension Implementation Meeting in Warsaw.

October 20, 2003 11:27

• 2003 elections: Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan

  On October 10-12, the seminar "Elections of 2003 in South Caucasian Countries and Their Impact on Regional Processes" took place in Tsakhkadzor. It was organized by the Yerevan Press Club with the support of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation.

October 18, 2003 14:07

• Action of protest against attacks on media has taken place in Poti

  The participants protested against the frequent cases of attacks on representatives of mass media by law-enforcement agencies.

October 18, 2003 13:33

• Elections in Azerbaijan: post-election clashes turn deadly

  From the roof of a nearby building, a Human Rights Watch researcher saw police and military troops chase down protesters, surround them and viciously beat them.

October 18, 2003 13:27

• Minister of Defense of Nagorny Karabakh: "The election of Ilkham Aliyev as President of Azerbaijan will lead to the progress in the Karabakh settlement"

  The minister stressed that the truce on the contact line of the Azerbaijan-Karabakh conflict was sustained mainly due to the balance of military forces, which was to a large extent conditioned by the level of economic development of the conflict parties.

October 18, 2003 11:03

• On the whole, penitentiary institutions of Nagorny Karabakh meet international standards

  The Karabakh non-government organization Center of Civil Initiatives continues to monitor penitentiary institutions of Nagorny Karabakh.

October 17, 2003 18:21

• Discussion about mechanisms of implementation of Law "On Freedom of Information" took place in Yerevan

  The Law "On Freedom of information" recently adopted by the National Assembly of Armenia is progressive. It is only necessary that mechanisms of its implementation should be worked out. This was noted at the round-table meeting organized by the Association of Investigative Journalists on October 15.

October 17, 2003 18:19

• Champion of law observance declared to be police wanted

  On October 13 Panakh Kerimov, an election committee member, handed over a ballot illegally marked in favor of Aliyev to political parties, local and international human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch, as evidence of the crime. On October 14 police hemmed in and blocked Kerimov?s house.

October 17, 2003 17:26

• Crisis Center has been created

  Violent clashes between security forces and opposition protesters in Azerbaijan left at least three civilians dead and hundreds wounded just one day after the falsified presidential elections of October 15.

October 17, 2003 16:30

• List of journalists suffered in clashes in Baku

  The Turan Information Agency published a list of journalists who were covering things happening in Baku and were beaten by the police.

October 17, 2003 16:26

• Aslan Maskhadov appealed to Chechen non-government organizations

  In Maskhadov's opinion, the Kremlin's policy in Chechnya aimed at settling the war conflict by means of armed forces has ended in a complete fiasco.

October 17, 2003 15:10

• Dozens of local and foreign journalists were beaten by interior troops soldiers in Baku

  The soldiers drove the journalists who were on the tribune into a corner and start trampling and batoning them.

October 17, 2003 14:37

• Appeal to OSCE Human Dimension Implementation Meeting participants

  "For the last three years those civil society activists who incurred the authorities' anger for any of several reasons have become a target of state repressions in the form of unconcealed judicial despotism and torture keeping conditions," reads the appeal.

October 16, 2003 19:57

• Opposition doesn't recognize Ilkham Aliyev's victory

  The capital's prosecutor's office has instituted criminal proceedings against 15 activists of the Musavat party on the accusation of public order violations and resistance to the police. In response, the Musavat party begins mass protests from today and states it will fight for its voters until the end.

October 16, 2003 19:00

• Statement of Federation of Azerbaijan's Human Rights Organizations

  The statement reads, "The preliminary analysis of information received is evidence that numerous violations on election day completed the picture of mass breaches, violence and lawlessness with which all the presidential election campaign was accompanied and of which the Federation repeatedly informed local public, the mass media and international organizations."

October 16, 2003 18:50

• Round table as attempt to find mutual understanding between representatives of public organizations and power organs of Ingushetia

  A round table for representatives of public organizations and power organs was arranged in the Sleptsovskaya village, Ingushetia, on October 11.

October 16, 2003 18:46

• Chechen Election Commission proclaimed results of republican presidential elections

  "The Election Commission of the Chechen Republic has not received complaints and applications on breaches of the electoral legislation that could have influenced voters' will", reads a resolution promulgated by the commission.

October 16, 2003 18:45

• Greenpeace hopes to save Sochi National Park from functionaries

  The activists of Greenpeace demanded that the ministry's leadership should fulfill tasks on the reserve system development determined by the law, but should not contribute to the destruction of reserves.