Russia’s Putin Accepts Resignation of North Ossetian President Dzasokhov

Europe - Russia
7 Jun 2005 - The Mos News

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Russian President Vladimir Putin has submitted the resignation of North Ossetian President Alexander Dzasokhov to the republic's parliament and suggested parliamentary speaker Taimuraz Mamsurov as his replacement, the Kremlin's press service was quoted by RIA Novosti on Tuesday. Dzasokhov will now represent Ossetia in the Federation Council, the Russian Senate.

Dzasokhov's press secretary Igor Dzantiyev announced his forthcoming resignation on May 31.

Dzasokhov, 71, said he had decided to resign "to give way to the younger generation."

"I am creating a precedent. While everyone is trying to extend their terms I have decided to shorten mine," RIA Novosti quoted him as saying.

Dzasokhov's second four-year term expires in January 2006. He first became president on Jan. 18, 1998 and was re-elected on January 27, 2002.

However, he does not intend to leave politics and will from now on represent his republic in the upper chamber of the Russian parliament, the Federation Council.

After the Semtember Beslan school massacre, with over 330 victims, among them 186 children, a wave of protests swept through the republic demanding the resignation of the local authorities, including the president. But at that time Dzasokhov refused to resign, in order "not to create a power vacuum", as he put it.

The speaker of the Ossetian parliament, Taimuraz Mamsurov, 51, enjoys the total support of the legislative assembly, though not the republic's population. Not even the Beslan tragedy could soften local attitudes towards Mamsurov - his son and daughter were among the hostages - with even a majority of the town's population not supporting Mamsurov's nomination for president.

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