Russian President Vladimir Putin has made an unscheduled visit to Chechnya, his first trip to the mainly Muslim republic within the Russian Federation in nearly 13 years.

Chechnya President Ramzan Kadyrov has invited Tesla CEO Elon Musk to Russia after being filmed behind the wheel of one of the company’s Cybertrucks mounted with a machine gun.

A prominent Russian investigative reporter has received a brain injury and multiple fractures when she and a lawyer accompanying her were brutally beaten by unidentified assailants in the Russian province of Chechnya.

Masked assailants in the Russian province of Chechnya have attacked and beaten a prominent journalist and a lawyer.

Fighters from Chechnya, the war-scarred Russian republic, are participating on both sides of the conflict in Ukraine.

Kadyrov said Wednesday, Jan. 20, 2021 that his forces have killed six suspected militants, including a warlord accused of organizing a 2011 suicide attack at a Moscow airport. He claimed that the raid marked the elimination of the last group of militants that remained in the region. (AP Photo/Musa Sadulayev, file)MOSCOW – Chechnya's Kremlin-backed leader said Wednesday that his forces have killed six suspected militants, including a warlord accused of organizing a 2011 suicide attack at a Moscow airport. After Umarov's death, Byutukayev became the leader of militants in Chechnya and swore allegiance to the Islamic State group. Despite Kadyrov’s relentless crackdown on suspected extremists, some of whom have sworn allegiance to the Islamic State group, militants have continued to launch sporadic attacks in Chechnya and other regions in Russia’s North Caucasus.

A general view shows the courtroom at the beginning of the trial of defendant Vadim K. in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2020. (Odd Andersen/Pool Photo via AP)BERLIN – A Russian accused of killing a Georgian man in broad daylight in downtown Berlin on Moscow's orders went on trial for murder Wednesday, in a case that has contributed to growing frictions between Germany and Russia. After the Aug. 23, 2019 killing, Germany expelled two Russian diplomats last December over the case, prompting Russia to oust two German diplomats in retaliation. Russian authorities confirmed the suspect’s passport, found on him at the time of his arrest, was valid, prosecutors said. It wasn't clear, they said, what he did between his departure from the hotel and the killing in Berlin at 11:55 a.m. on Aug. 23.

MOSCOW The United States on Monday slapped the regional strongman leader of Russia's republic of Chechnya with sanctions over human rights violations. Ramzan Kadyrov, 43, has run Chechnya like his personal fiefdom, relying on his security forces to quash dissent. International human rights groups have accused Kadyrov and his lieutenants of abductions, torture and killings of their opponents. Chechen authorities have denied those accusations, and federal authorities said a probe found nothing to support the charges. The Kremlin has relied on Kadyrov to stabilize Chechnya after two separatist wars, providing generous federal subsidies and dismissing international criticism of his rule.

FILE - In this Friday, May 10, 2019 file photo, Chechnya's regional leader Ramzan Kadyrov speaks during a meeting in Grozny, Russia. (AP Photo/Musa Sadulayev, file)MOSCOW The regional strongman leader of Russia's province of Chechnya on Thursday blamed unidentified foreign spy agencies for the recent killing in Austria of a Chechen man who criticized him. Austrian police have detained two ethnic Chechen men on suspicion of involvement in the killing, which is being investigated as a possible political assassination. On Tuesday, a group of Chechens rallied outside the Russian Embassy in Vienna to protest the killing. German prosecutors last month charged a Russian man in the brazen daylight killing in Berlin of an ethnic Chechen from Georgia.

This undated photo provided by HBO Documentary Films shows a scene from "Welcome to Chechnya." In documentary film, the anonymous source has often been reduced to a shadowy, voice-distorted figure, or worse, a pixelated blur. (HBO Documentary Films via AP)Anonymous sources in documentaries have often been reduced to a shadowy, voice-distorted figure or worse, a pixelated blur. In the predominantly Muslim region in southern Russia ruled by strongman Ramzan Kadyrov, LGBTQ Chechens have been detained, tortured and killed. The face doubles were shot on a blue screen stage and converted into algorithms that, with machine learning, could digitally mask the subjects of the film.

2002: Chechen terrorists seize the House of Culture theater in Moscow and take approximately 850 theater-goers hostage. The terrorists demanded the withdrawal of Russian forces from Chechnya and an end to the Second Chechen War. After a two-and-a-half day siege, Russian Spetsnaz forces pumped an unknown chemical agent (thought to be fentanyl, or 3-methylfentanyl), into the building's ventilation system and raided it. In the resulting fray, 39 of the attackers were killed by Russian forces, along with at least 129 of the hostages. Hide Caption