Policemen beat journalist

Journalist Alan Parastayev, director of the Center for Humanitarian Studies and Initiatives, was savagely beaten on the Transkam road near the Osetia tourist center at about 11 p.m. on December 30, when he made an attempt to obtain from South Osetian law enforcers information about a column of cars they had detained earlier. Relatives of the journalist, Sarmat Parastayev and Anna Chochiyeva, say that he was taken to the republican clinical hospital in an unconscious state. There he was in the reanimation department for several days. Head of the reanimation department Mr Pliyev established a skull injury and brain concussion.

South Osetian Interior Minister Guliyev told Mr Parastayev's wife, Anna Chochiyeva, that according to officers of the criminal investigation division, the drunk journalist used his fists against 11 policemen demanding that they should let pass the humanitarian aid sent by the Georgian government for Georgian villages in South Osetia and detained by the policemen in the center of Tskhinval.

Relatives and colleagues of Mr Parastayev are indignant at the explanation of the happening given by the minister, who justifies in fact the infliction of severe bodily injuries on the resident of South Osetia by officers of the interior ministry. No one has been detained in connection with the beating of Parastayev, his relatives report. Alan Parastayev himself can make the situation clear, but it is impossible now because he is in grave condition.