Medvedev sacks Deputy Interior Minister Edelev, who supervised power agents in Northern Caucasus

On February 18, General-Colonel Arkadiy Edelev, Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs, who was in charge of Northern Caucasus, was dismissed. The corresponding decree was signed by President Dmitri Medvedev, who had promised at the sitting of the MIA Collegium to reshuffle the ministerial cadre. Sources in the Kremlin report that Edelev may pass over to work for the office of the plenipotentiary representative at the North-Caucasian Federal District (NCFD) and head the Chief Department of the MIA for the NCFD, which Mr Medvedev suggested to create.

Mr Edelev was appointed to the position of Deputy Minister in 2004 and supervised the work of the Ministry in Northern Caucasus. During the Second Chechen War, the general headed the regional operative staff for conducting CTO in Chechnya, which was deployed in 2004 in Khankala. After the attempt on President of Ingushetia Yunus-Bek Evkurov in June 2009, President Medvedev scarified the work of the republic's MIA; and then operative groups from militiamen from other regions were set up in Ingushetia - Arkadiy Edelev coordinated their work.

Last summer Edelev was named among candidates to the post of the plenipotentiary in the Southern Federal District (SFD) instead of Vladimir Ustinov. And last autumn - to the post of the official in charge of the republics of Northern Caucasus, according to the idea presented by Russian President in his message to the Federal Assembly.

At present it is not known, who will now supervise Northern Caucasus among MIA bosses.

A source in the Kremlin told the "Gazeta.Ru" that the decision on this issue will be made by the Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliev.

Out of the current Nurgaliev's deputies, Nikolai Rogozhkin, Commander-in-Chief of the Internal Troops, is closest by his functions to coordination of operations in Northern Caucasus.

Experts believe that there was what to sack Edelev for.

"He's the man who failed to become a part of the system and cope with the assigned duties. Today, Northern Caucasus sees explosions day after day, bandits' and terrorists' operations on the daily basis. President has concluded that Edelev has failed his duties. In this case, I can neither agree with President nor object," said Victor Ilyukhin, a State Duma MP. He believes that the new plenipotentiary for the NCFD Khloponin is also dissatisfied with the situation and wants to replace the team.

Alexander Cherkasov, a member of the board of the HRC "Memorial", believes that it is all not so simple with Edelev's resignation. "His dismissal was a part of the broad-scale personnel reshuffling in the MIA. If it were a personal resignation of General-Colonel Edelev, who supervised Northern Caucasus, headed the CTO staff, was engaged in violent "Chechenization", when powers were delivered to the republic, and defended the tactics, which proved to be helpless, then, we could speak about Medvedev's discontent," the human rights activist has explained. "Now we don't know where he will go and who will take his powers."

However, most likely, Arkadiy Edelev will stay in the Caucasus. His experience and knowledge might be on demand at the NCFD office, as the source from the Kremlin concluded.