Background on Kazakh rebellion
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THE BACKGROUND: Street protests in Kazakhstan 20 years ago this weekend foreshadowed the demise of the Soviet Union four years later, but an ex-communist still rules the country and many Kazakhs still harbor grievances.
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A glance at Chechnya and its conflict:
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One of Kazakhstan's main opposition  parties said on Wednesday the state had begun legal moves to  close it down, accusing the party of breaching national  security.
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: Chechen rebel leader, Aslan Maskhadov, purportedly denied his involvement in the Russian school hostage-taking in a statement released on Friday and said another rebel chief, Shamil Basayev, should stand trial for staging it.
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There is almost nothing truthful in the satiric depiction of Kazakhstan popularized by Sacha Baron Cohen. And yet his character Borat has managed to infuriate the countryÂs officials.
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President Vladimir Putin depicts rebels in Chechnya as part of the international terrorist threat spearheaded by al-Qaida. But analysts say the Chechen insurgency remains largely a nationalist movement aimed at winning independence from Russia.
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Chechnya's rebel leader Aslan Maskhadov said that warlord Shamil Basayev would be put on trial for masterminding the hostage siege in Beslan which killed more than 330 people, once fighting has stopped in the breakaway republic.
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At least 22 Chechen rebels were killed by Russian troops in the separatist republic, including a man officials say was linked to the assassination of Chechnya âs pro-Moscow president Akhmad Kadyrov.
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In 1991, landlocked Uzbekistan became a sovereign nation after decades of Russian and Soviet influence. Since 1990, Islam Karimov has been the areaâs most notorious politician.
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MOSCOW - According to a Chechen rebel Web Site, Shamil Basayev, a Chechen warlord, has issued a statement on Friday, in which he claims responsibility for Beslan school siege.
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BISHKEK, Jan 29 (IPS) - The central Asian republic of Kyrgyzstan has  adopted a new constitution specifically banning all taking of  life and lawyers are now drafting revisions to its legal code  replacing the maximum criminal sentence of death by firing squad  with long prison terms.
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The son-in-law of Kazakhstan's autocratic president &#151; wanted in his homeland on kidnapping charges &#151; has been released on bail, an official said Sunday.
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The trial of 21 medical workers allegedly linked to an HIV outbreak is under way in Kazakhstan.
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Attacks by Chechen separatists in Grozny, the capital of the breakaway Russian republic, have left several people dead. Russian news agencies reported that a number of Chechen fighters had been killed along with several pro-Russian policemen.
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Excerpt from report by Russian news agency ITAR-TASS  Vienna, 3 June: Today the former Kazakh ambassador to Austria, Rakhat Aliyev [Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev's son-in-law], was released from arrest on a bail of 1m euros and a written undertaking not to leave [the country].
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BBC News Online profiles the top Chechen rebels sought by Russia for 300m roubles ($10m) following the Beslan school siege in North Ossetia.
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Radical Chechen rebel leader Shamil Basayev has apparently taken responsibility for a recent series of terrorist attacks in Russia.