The Dangers Of Wearing A Headscarf.

(From The Moscow Times)

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One week ago in the center of Makhachkala, assailants gunned down Colonel Mogamed-Arip Aliyev, head of the local branch of the Interior Ministry in the city of Buinaksk. There had been several previous attempts on his life. Once, his attackers placed a bucket filled with explosives in Aliyev's home, but rain later dampened the detonator, foiling their plans. Aliyev's children found the bucket with explosives while playing the next day.

Before his death, Aliyev eliminated three of the four groups that wanted to kill him; no arrest warrants were needed to execute the operations.

The late Gazimagomed Gimrinsky was both an Islamic extremist and a Federal Security Service agent. In his line of work, Gimrinsky had turned on 120 of his fellow Islamists, handing them over to the FSB. After Aliyev had received information from Gimrinsky about a new group of insurgents, Aliyev took a gun, walked into the dormitory where the rebels were hiding out and killed them all. Aliyev was, in a word, gutsy.

Bammatkhan Sheikhov is thought to be the leader of the Buinaksk Wahhabi community. He lived in Moscow and ran a business here. He wasn't hassled because of his conspicuous beard or because his wife always wore a headscarf. But as soon as Sheikhov returned to his native Buinaksk to make some repairs to his home, he was beaten and his house was searched weekly.