The news in Chechnya has an unlikely Canadian face: a former fashion model with a catchy name who anchors the news in English on state-run TV.
"Good evening. This is Chrystal Callahan and these are the highlights of the week," says the smiling anchor at the start of her program. "The Chechen Republic is steadily becoming a region of example for other parts of Russia!"
Aided by a constant stream of Chechen sub-titles, Grozny TV's English-speaking anchor from Toronto has arguably become the most famous foreigner in post-war Chechnya.
In 2010, the Paris-based watchdog organization Reporters Without Borders added Chechen President Kadyrov to its list of 40 "Predators of Press Freedom." For years human rights groups have accused Kadyrov and his security forces of kidnapping, torture and even extra-judicial killings.
The group pointed out vocal critics of Kadyrov keep getting murdered. Most recently, Austrian police linked one of Kadyrov's top aides to the fatal shooting of a Chechen dissident named Umar Israilov in Vienna, Austria.
Kadyrov routinely denies these charges. Callahan dismisses them too. "If there's no proof and there's no concrete evidence, who cares?" Callahan asks.