MOSCOW, Sept 24 (AFP) - Russian President Vladimir Putin's new envoy to the North Caucasus, appointed in the wake of the Beslan hostage tragedy, on Friday denounced widespread "corruption and abuse of power" in the region.
Dmitry Kozak, Putin's representative in southern Russia, charged that the region was "overrun by the worst sorts of crime, from terrorism and banditry to corruption and abuse of power at all levels of the local executive government."
Kozak is the chair of a new federal committee for the North Caucasus, created in mid-September as Putin moved to tighten Kremlin control over the Russian regions following the Beslan siege.
Speaking at the committee's first meeting, Kozak took aim at a waste of resources and poor cooperation between the government and law enforcement agencies, according to ITAR-TASS news agency.
"A great many civil servants are responsible for the same tasks, but act in contradiction with each other," he said of the bureaucracy.
"Everyone has a negative attitude towards the work of the law enforcement and security forces in the region," said the official, promising to announce a series of recommendations by the end of the year.
Putin has said that improving state social support in the North Caucasus was a matter of strategic importance for Russia and that weakness in this area made the region a stronghold for terrorism.
He has also called for tougher penalties for officials who through breach of responsibility have assisted extremists in carrying out attacks in Russia.
Chechen separatist rebels have claimed responsibility for the Beslan school siege in southern Russia on September 1-3 in which at least 339 people were killed, half of them children.