CHECHNYA LINKS LIBRARY

The Week in Brief: Dec 18 - Dec 24, 2000

Mon, Dec 18

Russia announced that Shirvani Basayev, the younger brother of Shamil Basayev, had been killed about a month ago. However, the Chechen side refuted the report.

Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze admitted that hundreds of Chechen fighters were staying in Georgia but rejected Moscow's proposal of carrying out joint "clean up operations" in the Pankisi gorge.

Lieutenant-General Vladimir Bulgakov, chief-of-staff of the North Caucasus military district, refused to replace Lieutenant-General Valery Baranov as the head of the unified military group in Chechnya.

Georgian State Security Minister Vakhtang Kutateladze left for Moscow to meet with Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) Director Nikolai Patrushev.

Conference on restoration of Chechnya's economy was held at the President Hotel in Moscow. Ali Visayev, President of the Moscow Universities Alumni Club, was the initiator of the conference.

Stavropol territorial court opened hearings on the case of Chechen Ramses Gaichayev charged with genocide. According to investigators, Gaichayev and his accomplices murdered ten Russian inhabitants of the village of Chervlyonnaya.

Secret Police Day in Russia, earlier called Chekist Day.

Six people (five students and an instructor) were killed and fifteen wounded in a grenade attack at the University in the Chechen capital Grozny.

Akhmar Zavgayev was elected for the Russian upper house of parliament, the Federation Council, to become the first senator for Chechnya since 1997.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered that the Internal Affairs Ministry beef up the security of members of Chechnya's administration. A total of 2,000 people have been allocated to strengthen the police in Chechnya.

Director of the Federal Security Service of Russia Nikolai Patrushev has officially confirmed the arrest of Turpal Atgeriyev, former state security minister of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria.

The State Auditing Commission found out that 280 million rubles, allocated especially for buying food for Russian soldiers, has disappeared.

No major events

A group of Russian MPs, headed by Boris Nemtsov and including Aslanbek Aslakhanov, Sergey Kovalyov, Pavel Krasheninnikov and Oleg Morozov, left for Ingushetia. In the new Ingush capital Magas the group held talks on a political solution to the conflict in Chechnya with seven members of the Chechen parliament elected in 1997. The group of Chechen representatives was allegedly led by Khoj-Akhmed Yerikhanov who participated in peace talks during the first war in Chechnya (1994-96).

Sun, Dec 24

No major events.

Compiled by Prague Watchdog