Free Republic

One of those present at the training ground in Belgorod during the execution by some mobilized others told the Astra Telegram channel that the cause of the conflict could be religious - shortly before the incident, Lieutenant Colonel Andrey Lapin said that Allah is a coward, since he does not allow Muslims to fight for a country where you took an oath. The authors of the material emphasize that at the time of publication they were unable to independently confirm the identity of either the narrator himself or the identity of other persons appearing in the story. “It all started...

On the surface, the Russian resort town of Sochi provides an ideal setting for the world to convene for the 2014 Olympics. Its subtropical coastline on the Black Sea offers beautiful palm-lined seashores for the tourists — February temperatures should be in the 10 C range — while the nearby snow-covered mountains present an ideal staging ground for outdoor winter sports. "But historically and politically, it's a loaded area," warns John Colarusso, a professor of humanities at McMaster University and a freqent writer on the language and culture of the Caucasus, the mountainous region between the Black and Caspian seas....