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Revision as of 02:48, 15 July 2010 by Saiga12 (talk | contribs) (No link)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)The Kavkaz Center (KC, literally Caucasus center) is a privately-run Internet publication by pro-Chechen-Insurgents which aims to be "a Chechen internet agency which is independent, international and Islamic" that "does not represent the viewpoint of any state structures". The stated mission of the site is to report events related to Chechnya and also to "provide international news agencies with news-letters, background information and assistance in making independent journalistic work in Caucasus according to itself."
Since its inception it has broadcast Chechen separatist propaganda in support for the secession of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria and later the Caucasian Emirate and the mujahideen worldwide. The website published in five languages, English, Arabic, Ukrainian, Russian, and Turkish.
Background
The KC was founded in March 1999 in the city of Grozny, Chechnya, by the National Center for Strategic Research and Political Technologies, headed by Movladi Udugov, former Minister of Information of the Chechnya and then-leader of the "national information service".
Controversy
The Kavkaz Center caused a major controversy in September 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 the Chechen rebel commander Shamil Basayev claiming responsibility for the Beslan school hostage crisis and a series of photos from the preparations for the attack were published on the site. The website subsequently re-opened on a webserver at the Internet service provider PRQ, in Sweden, and then in April 2008 to an Estonian server, supplied by the AS Starman.
After the October 2005 Nalchik attack in the republic of Kabardino-Balkaria, the Kavkaz Center alleged that it was targeted by a discredit campaign from the FSB, which consisted on a massive worldwide distribution of spam mail which supposedly came from the Kavkaz Center website. After receiving several DoS attacks, a message was published on the homepage, stating that they never sent the spam many people received, and that it was a discredit campaign against them because of their points of view. Another spam attack campaign was active again on November 29, 2005, soliciting donations to a bank account in Sweden.
On the other hand, David McDuff, an editor with Prague Watchdog, has written that the Kavkaz Center is "thought by some observers to be a disinformation center run with the help of Russia’s special services."
In 2006, Russian journalist and regular KC contributor Boris Stomakhin was sentenced by a Moscow court to five years in prison for "fueling religious hatred". Another Russian regular contributor, Pavel Lyuzakov, was sentenced to two years in a prison colony for illegally acquiring and possessing a firearm in 2005.
References
- RADICALIZATION OF THE CHECHEN RESISTANCE OR THE TACTICAL CHOICE OF THE LEADERSHIP?
- About Kavkaz Center (The Caucasus Center)
- Russia: Chechen Rebel Leader Reshuffles Ministers
- Operational base of Mujahideen in Northern Ossetia (August, 2004)
- «Kavkaz-Center» Terrorist Website Located in Estonia
- FSB launches a SPAM-war against Kavkaz Center
- A Step At A Time - Versions - 3
- KAVKAZ-CENTER WRITER APPEALS JAIL SENTENCE
- KAVKAZCENTER CORRESPONDENT CONVICTED