Nalchik/Agency Caucasus – Religious authorities began to urge the Kabarda-Balkar people to stay in peace with the authority as well as with the accepted social norms after recent attacks hit security forces of the country in a similar way to the youth uprising that happened on September 13, 2005.
Anas Pshihachev, Valentin Bobilev and Levi Shabayev, top religious authorities of Islam, Christianity and Judaism respectively in Kabardino-Balkaria, penned a joint statement on July 9. "Six police officers have been killed since early 2008: Kiyarov Anatoli Sultanovich, Rahayet Albert Hizirovich, Nagoyev Azamat Muhtarovich, Adjiyev Admir Tolevich, Thakumachev Hasan Hamidbiyevich, Kanloyev Huseyin Bilyalovich. Most of them were still under 30 years of age. Their kids were left fatherless, their parents childless."
All three religious authorities said that the on-slaughters sought justification in religion for their brutal acts of killing: "The police officers became a target for terrorist attacks, because the Kabarda-Balkar police are capable of making ineffective their efforts to disturb the social as well as political peace."
All religious authorities were assigned the primary mission of preventing terrorism in action and radicalism in thought, said the top three religious authorities in their joint statement, and called upon the citizens of Kabardino-Balkaria to help security forces in their battle against crimes.
Kabardino-Balkaria should be freed from the threat of terrorism so that business companies from Russia and other countries can be allured to invest under the guaranteed guidance of the Kabarda-Balkar government, the religious authorities warned. "Unless the situation is not changed soon, stability and a nice future will only be the things to be fancied." SKNWS/ÖZ/FT
