[Airbornelawyer]

From the RFE/RL Newsline:

Russia

• DEFENSE MINISTER DENIES REPORTS OF MILITARY OVERHAUL
  Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said in Moscow on 14 December that there are no plans to radically reform the command of the armed forces, Russian news agencies reported. The previous day, "Nezavisimaya gazeta" daily quoted unidentified Defense Ministry officials as saying the top military leadership is planning a radical reorganization of the army command. The newspaper report claimed that the reform envisioned replacing the current four fleets and six military districts with three large regional command centers -- Far Eastern, Central Asian, and West European. It said the changes are planned to start in 2006 and are expected to take several years to implement. Ivanov, while denying plans to scrap military districts, said he is not against setting up regional command centers, but only after careful evaluation. In other remarks, Ivanov denied reports that Ukraine has demanded an increase in rent payments for the presence of Russia's Black Sea Fleet on Ukrainian territory.

• CHECHEN STRONGMAN ARGUES AGAINST RENAMING GROZNY
  Dukvakha Abdurakhmanov, who is speaker of the lower chamber of the new Chechen parliament, proposed on 14 December renaming Grozny Akhmed-Kala in memory of pro-Moscow Chechen administration head Akhmed-Hadji Kadyrov, who was killed in a terrorist bombing last year, Interfax reported. Abdurakhmanov said the current toponym (which means "dread" or "terror-inducing" in Russian) reflects "the darkest pages of Chechen history." But Kadyrov's son Ramzan, who is Chechen first deputy prime minister, told lenta.ru on 14 December he sees no reason to rename the capital, and that the most appropriate way to honor his father's memory would be to rebuild the ruined city. Russian human rights activists, too, rejected Abdurakhmanov's suggestion as inappropriate, Interfax reported. Abdul-Khakim Sultygov, a Chechen who coordinates ethnic policy for the pro-Kremlin Unified Russia party, suggested to Interfax on 14 December that once Grozny has been rebuilt a referendum could be held among the population of Chechnya on whether it should be renamed.

Transcaucasia And Central Asia

• KARABAKH LEADER QUESTIONS PROSPECTS FOR CONFLICT SETTLEMENT...
  Arkadii Ghukasian, president of the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, questioned on 14 December suggestions that recent progress in Armenian-Azerbaijani peace talks offered a new opportunity for a resolution of the Karabakh conflict, RFE/RL's Armenian Service reported. The Karabakh leader added that "we are pretty far from a settlement today" and dismissed the contention that next year will be "an optimal time for settling" the conflict as "a mere desire." He also indicated that representatives from Karabakh should be included in the negotiations, warning that "we do not believe any success is possible without our participation," Yerkir reported. The statement followed a meeting with the French, Russian and U.S. OSCE Minsk Group co-chairmen in Yerevan. The visiting OSCE mediators also met on 14 December with Armenian President Robert Kocharian and are expected to arrive in Baku on 15 December.

• ...BUT ARMENIAN FOREIGN MINISTER EXPRESSES OPTIMISM
  Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanian expressed "optimism" on 14 December for the Karabakh peace process in a Yerevan press conference, according to RFE/RL's Armenian Service. The foreign minister added that "2005 was a productive year" and noted the recent statement by EU Foreign and Security Policy Commissioner Javier Solana defining the coming year as a new opportunity for a solution to the Karabakh conflict. Oskanian added that further progress in the peace process now rests on the outcome of next month's planned meeting between the Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents. Peace talks are reportedly now centering on a phased settlement that would address the status of Karabakh through a referendum that would follow the return of liberation of six of the seven Armenian-held districts of Azerbaijani districts beyond the borders of Nagorno Karabakh.

• ABKHAZ OFFICIAL DENIES REPORTS OF FORCED INDUCTION INTO ARMED FORCES...
  Abkhaz Deputy Defense Minister Lieutenant General Anatolii Zaitsev has rejected as untrue Georgian media reports that young Georgian men have been taken by force from their homes in Abkhazia's southernmost Gali district and inducted into the armed forces of the unrecognized Republic of Abkhazia, apsny.ru reported on 14 December. Caucasus Press reported on 14 December that Abkhaz police took 15 young Georgians by force from their homes in Gali's Okumi village; on 14 December, Caucasus Press gave the number of young men involved first as 17, and then as 19, but said later three of them have been released. The young men's parents staged a protest on 14 December outside the Gali district police headquarters but failed to secure their sons' release, Caucasus Press reported.

• TAJIK MINE CENTER CANNOT CONFIRM UZBEK STATEMENTS ON MINE-CLEARING
  Jonmuhammad Rajabov, the head of Tajikistan's mine-clearing center, has said that he cannot confirm the recent statement by Uzbek Ambassador Shoqosim Shoislomov that Uzbekistan has begun clearing mines along the Tajik-Uzbek border, RFE/RL's Tajik Service reported on 14 December. While Uzbekistan may have begun mine-clearing operations in locations deep within Uzbekistan, Rajabov said that his center has received no notification of mine-clearing operations on the border itself. Specialists from the center noted that most of the mines are located in remote, mountainous regions where mine-clearing operations would be especially difficult now that ice and snow have covered the ground. Nevertheless, Rajabov described Shoislomov's statement as encouraging. Uzbekistan mined the border several years ago to prevent incursions by Islamist militants. In Tajikistan, seven people have been killed by mines and 12 wounded since the beginning of 2005.