Termination of adaptation programmes increases threat of militants' stepping up in Northern Caucasus

So far, the growth in the number of armed incidents in Kabardino-Balkaria does not mean a real militants' activation, but the conditions for the operation of the armed underground have not disappeared, but the work on militants' adaptation has been curtailed, analysts assert.

In July, law enforcers detained three residents of the Urvan District, who had assembled bombs for making explosions in public places. According to law enforcers, they had joined an international terrorist organization.

So far, it is too early to talk about the real intensification of militants in Kabardino-Balkaria, since reports about killed militants and detained alleged terrorists arrive from law enforcers, said Valery Borschov, a member of the Moscow Helsinki Group. According to his version, law enforcers are deliberately overstating the results of their work; and their reports fail to reflect the real situation.

At the same time, Mr Borschov did not rule out that radicals in Northern Caucasus became more active. A prerequisite for this, as he considers, was the curtailing of social programmes for militants' adaptation.

Mikhail Roschin, an Orientalist, is sure that it is necessary to resume the work of organizations dealing with militants' adaptation.

Valery Khatazhukov, the head of the Kabardino-Balkarian Human Rights Centre, believes that the radicalization process is associated with socio-economic reasons and low living standards of the population of the region.