CHECHNYA LINKS LIBRARY

Russian army vacates school in Grozny

By Timur Aliyev

GROZNY, Chechnya - In advance of the new school year, federal forces have vacated a secondary school in Grozny they have occupied since 2000, announced Saypi Utsiyev, the Deputy Minister of Education of the Chechen Republic.

Since the beginning of 2000, one unit of the Russian Defence Ministry has been stationed on the premises of the School No.18. They were guarding a main road, Leninsky Prospekt, and a section of railway line in close proximity to the school.

Utsiyev said that the damaged school would need "in the order of 70 to 80 million roubles" in repairs to make it ready for students. It will be necessary to include this in the 2006 federal programme for reconstruction in Chechnya, he added.

Recently the Chechen Ministry of Education succeeded in negotiating the withdrawal of federal troops from a number of schools and kindergartens, including the Center of Tourism and Regional Studies for Children in Grozny's Oktyabrsky District, and two kindergartens in Argun and the Shelkovsky District (No.1 and No. 3, respectively).

Federal forces continue to occupy a number of other schools, including the Secondary School No. 2 in Zandak, two in the Nozhai-Yurtovsky District (No.1 and No.14), one in the village of Naurskaya (No.7), and a boarding school for deaf-mute children in Grozny.

Data from the Ministry of Education says there are 460 functioning schools in Chechnya. More than 200,000 pupils will attend them this year.

(MG/E,T)