On 24 June night the chief of Buynaksky ROVD Arip Aliev was shot in Makhachkala while driving in his Mercedes. He was one of the toughest enemies for Dagestan Islamic fighters. It’s easy to guess who murdered him. Three groups of gunmen had attempted on Arip, two of which he liquidated. And in the third group, commanded by Zakaryaev brothers, one of them, Abdulgapur, survived.

Four days after the murder the Dagestani MVD assaulted a flat where had been staying Rashid Gazilaliev, a German teacher of the local pedagogic university, his wife Sevda and a certain Shamil who came to visit them. Later he was identified as Rustam Kazanbiev. 

The law enforcement bodies stated that people in the flat were the Islamic fighters, that they shot one another and that all of them were on the wanted file. In private conversations the MVD people stated that exactly those killed had shot Arip Aliev. However, officially such a statement was never made, possibly, because of investigation taken by a Dagestani newspaper “Chernovik” (fittingly, Rush Copy).

Chernovik managed to find out quickly that Gazilaliev was not put on the wanted file and the way of suicide “chosen” by him, looked quite oddly: he was killed with a fragment of grenade that stuck in his back of head.  

Dagestani President Mukhu Aliev received the father of the killed man and demanded that the accident be investigated thoroughly. After that the prosecutor’s office accused the Chernovik editor of extremism and the newspaper’s office was searched through. 

Last week, searches were done again. They were held at home of the editor Nadira Isaeva, the newspaper’s founder Gadjimurad Kamalov and the journalist Arthur Mamaev. The search took place the next day after another meeting at the Dagestani President’s office where Gadjimurad Kamalov accused the head of MVD Adilgerei Magomedtagirov of many unpleasant things. All that happened 2 days before the meeting of protest occasioned by the death of Rashid Gazilaliev. 

The case against “Chernovik” editor was started on the ground of a reference given by a certain expert Fedyaev. Giving his written opinion, this expert did not give any content of a single newspaper’s article and did not adduce any quotation of “extremist” character. Generally, on numerous pages of his document Mr. Fedyaev has quoted only one sentence by the newspaper that contained, in his opinion, the signs that are subject to Article 129 of the Russian Criminal Code, dealing with slander. (Actually, according to the Russian Criminal Code an expert is not entitled to apply terms, that’s beyond his competence – editorial note).       

Following that quotation, the authorities in Caucasus are used as instrument for unfair competition, and “bluntly speaking, they get corrupted”. “The practice flourishes widely of ungrounded preferences made in distribution of contracts, and financial and material resources. As a rule, there are interests of concrete officials standing behind that… ” 

Oh sorry! This was a quotation from Vladimir Putin. And the one from Chernovik goes like this. “Corruption, to which Aliev himself is actually conductive, aggravates this “social-economic situation” and contributes to spread of extremist feeling”.    

(published with abridgements)