Chechnya has been largely ruined by years of fighting dating back to the start of the first military campaign launched in 1994 to "restore constitutional order." Trouble has spilled over into neighboring republics including Ingushetia and Daghestan.
"We will restore towns and villages and eliminate Wahhabites," Ramzan Kadyrov told journalists at the opening of a reconstructed street in the center of Grozny, Chechnya's capital.
On June 14, Kadyrov, the son of late Chechen president Akhmad Kadyrov, the Kremlin-backed leader credited with starting rebuilding work in the troubled region before his 2004 assassination, reported to the Chechen parliament on what had been done in the first 100 days of his premiership.
"Each new facility commissioned in Chechnya gives people hope for the future, and helps a population torn by the war revive," Kadyrov said Monday. "Grozny is the heart of Chechnya, each street restored here is of huge significance for people."
Speaking to a delegation of European diplomats June 2, Kadyrov suggested that the area could become a tourist destination in the future.
