MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's southern region of Ingushetia is trying to overcome its reputation for bombs, murders and shootouts by paying for a glossy supplement featuring strutting dancers and smiling mothers.
The eight-page, full colour supplement entitled "MyFavourite Republic" appeared inside copies of the popularMoscow newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda on Tuesday.
Inside the supplement a minister explains the secrets ofthe republic's economic success story, a baby lies peacefullyin a modern hospital ward and photos show children laughing andplaying football.
The supplement did not though mention the violence in theregion as security forces struggle to quell an Islamistinsurgency. Kidnappings, murders and assassinations arefrequent.
"Ingushetia, it is an amazing, beautiful region," thesupplement said on its front page. "You could talk about itendlessly."
Ingushetia borders Chechnya, the focus of two wars betweenRussian soldiers and rebels since 1994 which killed thousandsand destroyed the region's economy. But over the last 12 monthsthe violence has shifted to Ingushetia.
Military helicopters fly daily missions over Ingushetia andWestern aid agencies say the army has to search the roadsidesevery morning for bombs and booby-traps.
In a fresh reminder of the violence, a series of explosionshit the region's biggest city, Nazran, on Tuesday. No one wasinjured.
"The customer (of the supplement) was the government ofIngushetia," the supplement's editor Natalya Korniyenko toldReuters. "The customer pays and we prepare the work."
A spokesperson for Ingush President Murat Zyazikovconfirmed it had supplied information for the supplement butdid not say how much it had paid for it to appear.
(Reporting by James Kilner; edited by Richard Meares)