This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Bk0 (talk | contribs) at 12:50, 21 October 2005 (try to make it at least somewhat NPOV...). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.
Revision as of 12:50, 21 October 2005 by Bk0 (talk | contribs) (try to make it at least somewhat NPOV...)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)The Kavkaz Center is an Internet publication that claims to be "a Chechen independent international Islamic internet agency". It was founded in March 1999 in the city of Grozny, by the National Center for Strategic Research and Political Technologies, headed by Movladi Udugov, former Minister for Information of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, currently wanted under terrorism charges in the CIS and Turkey. The self-proclaimed mission of the site is to provide news and commentary of interest to Muslims. Critics say that it serves largely to spread Chechen rebel propaganda and disinformation, and to promote Udugov's political aims.
Published in three languages, English, Russian, and Turkish, the contents of the three language web pages differ wildly and seem to have no relation to each other - the Russian version primarily lists articles attacking the Russian government and used to feature a bizzare collection of sexually-explicit tabloid stories collected from around Russia (this part of the site has now been toned down), while the English version contains articles that seek to draw attention to claimed human rights violations by the Russian army, and to support Iraqi and Afghan insurgents. Some sources allege most of the content on The Kavkaz Center is written by Udugov himself under pseudonyms ).
The Kavkaz Center caused a controversy in September of 2004 when the server it was being hosted on, located in Lithuania, was shut down by Lithuanian authorities on hate speech charges, after a letter from Shamil Basayev claiming responsibility for the Beslan school hostage crisis was published on the site (Basayev and Udugov are claimed to be close friends). The website subsequently re-opened on a webserver in Sweden.