"Memorial" presents bulletin on situation in Northern Caucasus for three years

The Moscow-based office of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial" has hosted a presentation of the bulletin "Three years of 'stability'"," telling about the situation in Northern Caucasus during the period from autumn 2009 to autumn 2012.

The compilers are Grigory Verny, Oleg Orlov and Alexander Cherkasov. The bulletin was published by the state support of the Russian Federation and of the Embassy of Norway.

According to Oleg Orlov, the main problem of Northern Caucasus is the clannish system, or tribalism. Another important point, as he said, is religion, since Islam has a strong political background.

He also noted that the armed underground "is self-reproducing"; and the victory over illegal armed formations (IAFs) is unattainable, if only force methods and "pumping money" are used. They need "deep systemic changes" of the economy, social relations, organization of state structures, the rights defender said.

According to statistics presented by Mr Orlov, in the period from 2006 to 2007, the losses of federal forces in casualties and wounded persons went down from 935 to 536 people. Thereafter, as he noted, militants passed over from the tactics of armed clashes to the tactics of explosions, terror acts, including the use of suicide bombers.

Oleg Orlov also criticized the "hypertrophic use of force" in the fight against the armed underground, which was noted, for example, in Chechnya.