BY MADELEINE LEROYER, SCIENCES PO, SPECIAL TO THE MEDILL NEWS SERVICE

[A version of this story won third prize in the 2007 Daniel Pearl Award, a competition sponsored by The Wall Street Journal, in collaboration with the Ecole de Journalisme de Sciences Po in Paris, and was published in the Wall Street Journal Online]

Read the English version
Read the French version
Read the interview of Jean-Francois Dubost in English or in French). Lawyer, specialized in international law, Jean-Francois Dubost is the head of the "Refugee Department" at Amnesty International France.

A balloon explodes. Raissa jumps, her hands pressed hard on her pregnant belly. Another balloon explodes. Her eyes feverishly look for her sons. It's Dec. 26, 2006, in Brest, France. The association, Brest Education Without Borders, that coordinates the different collectives that provide relief to the undocumented migrants living in the city, has organized a Christmas party in the association's house. Children play. Raissa tries to forget the memories, the explosions, the bombs.

BY NATASHA ROTSTEIN, MEDILL NEWS SERVICE

[to the related stories, A Chechen copes through Sambo fighting and Chechnya's war legacy]

When Khassan Baiev realizes the Boston traffic will keep him from arriving on time at his daughter Satsita's day care center, he quickly grabs his cell phone.

"I am stuck in traffic," he tells Magomed Amir Imakaev and asks if Imakaev can pick up his daughter.

Such is a typical moment for these two Chechen families, who moved to Boston to get away from the war in Chechnya.

The first Chechen War began in December 1994 and ended Aug. 31, 1996. The second war began in September 1999 and is still ongoing. It is estimated that roughly 250,000 Chechen civilians died between 1994 and 2003.

According to reports issued by the Human Rights Watch, Chechnya has become a dangerous place for civilians.

"We have also found compelling evidence of at least three sets of massacres, in which Russian forces summarily executed at least 122 unarmed civilians, many of them women and the elderly. Russian forces have looted Chechen homes with abandon, raped women, and arrested hundreds of civilians - men, women and children--on suspicion of aiding rebel fighters," one report says.

BY NATASHA ROTSTEIN, MEDILL NEWS SERVICE

[A version of this story also appeared in The Moscow Times on Sept. 20, 2006]

[to the lead story, The Sound of Chechen music and related stories, A Chechen copes through Sambo fighting and Chechnya's war legacy]

Every night during the first war in Chechnya this family slept in the same bed. Mother and father separated by their daughter and son.

If a bomb hits the building, we'll die together, they reasoned.

Nine years have passed since those dark days when they witnessed dogs eating people and snow black from debris. They buried 23 family members.

The family - 56-year-old Kuri, his wife Nina, and their children, 26-year-old Kerim and 23-year-old Heda - moved to the Netherlands in November 1997.

For their safety, they asked that their last name and town of residence not be included in the story.

BY NATASHA ROTSTEIN, MEDILL NEWS SERVICE

[to the related story, The Sound of Chechen music]

The opponents' strained, muscular arms locked like horns of fighting bulls as each man struggled to ensure his place in the next round of competition.

A doctor by trade and author of The Oath: A Surgeon Under Fire, Baiev witnessed much violence while working in a small village outside of Grozny during the first and second war. He now turns to martial arts to help him cope with the traumatic memories he has of the war.

BY NATASHA ROTSTEIN, MEDILL NEWS SERVICE

Chechens have long struggled for their independence from Russia.

Some of Russia's 100 nationalities were granted their own ethnic enclave with varying formal federal rights in Soviet times. Smaller nationalities were not granted such recognition. Relations between the central government calling for far-reaching autonomy and subordinate jurisdictions became a political issue in the 1990s. These demands were satisfied by concessions over regional autonomy and tax privileges in almost all cases and The Federation Treaty was signed by everyone except Chechnya and Tatarstan.

BY NATASHA ROTSTEIN, MEDILL NEWS SERVICE

[to the Profile, A Chechen family finds refuge in the Netherlands yet yearns to return and related stories, A Chechen copes through Sambo fighting and Chechnya's war legacy]

Closing his eyes and moving his arms from side to side, Kerim begins rapping in the makeshift studio in a corner of his bedroom.

I feel if you die, you die
I'd rather not be reborn
Would rather not be reborn into this."

Dressed in baggy pants and a baseball cap, the young man resembles a typical college student pursuing a hobby after school. Kerim, who now lives in the Netherlands, began writing poetry in 1996 as a young man living through the first war in Chechnya.

The first Chechen War began in December 1994 and ended Aug. 31, 1996. The second war began in September 1999 and is still ongoing. It is estimated that roughly 250,000 Chechen civilians died between 1994 and 2003.

But it wasn't until 2002, when he and several friends decided to start DJIGIT.com, a web site where Chechens can chat, listen to music Kerim or his friends have written and find out what's happening in their home country. The name, which means horseman, was a nickname his uncle gave him as a child.