Alu Alkhanov

He is widely seen to be conflicted with Ramzan Kadyrov, a former rebel fighter and Chechen Republic's Prime Minister with presidential ambitions. Kadyrov eventually replaced Alkhanov as President in February 2007, following by placing his own people in all the leading positions.

On June 1, 2006, Alkhanov said he would prefer his republic be governed by Sharia law and suggested adapting the Islamic code.

Alkhanov is a career police officer who fought within the ranks of the Russian Armed Forces during the First Chechen War. He was elected president on August 30, 2004, under controversial circumstances. On February 15, 2007, Russian President Vladimir Putin dismissed Alkhanov as the Chechen President and appointed him a Deputy Justice Minister of Russia.

When the First Chechen War broke out in 1994, Alkhanov supported the Russian side against the separatists. He was decorated with the Order of Courage for his actions during the separatists' assault on Grozny in 1996. In April 2003, he was appointed Interior Minister of Chechnya in the government of Akhmad Kadyrov and was made a Major General of the Chechen police. When Kadyrov was assassinated on May 9, 2004, Akhnanov became the favoured candidate of the Russian government.

Alu Alkhanov's election in August 2004 was controversial from the outset. The election of his predecessor had been marred by allegations of ballot stuffing, voter intimidation by Russian soldiers and the exclusion of possible separatist candidates. As a career bureaucrat, Alkhanov had no obvious popular base and was seen by many observers as the placeman of the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Critics of Russian policy in Chechnya claimed that the government would not permit Alkhanov to be defeated, and that the outcome of the vote had been predetermined well in advance.

Born in Taldykorgan Province, Kazakhstan, Alkhanov joined the Soviet Armed Forces on leaving school. He joined the Soviet Militsiya service in 1983, graduating from the transport police school in Mogilev (now Mahilyow in Belarus). He went on to the High Police School in Rostov-on-Don before becoming Deputy Head of the North Caucasus Transport Department of the former Chechen-Ingushetia government in Grozny in 1992. He was later promoted to head the department, a post which he held until 1997.

Alu Dadashevich Alkhanov (Russian: Алу Дадашевич Алханов ; born January 20, 1957) is a Chechen politician, the former president of Russia's Chechen Republic.