MOSCOW, July 29 (Reuters) - The United Nations said on Monday it was indefinitely suspending its humanitarian operations in Russia's rebel Chechnya, following the kidnapping there of a Russian aid worker employed by a local organisation.
A U.N. spokeswoman said Nina Davidovich, head of the non-governmental organisation Druzhba, was seized on July 23 in the breakaway province, where kidnapping for ransom has turned into a lucrative business. She gave no further details.
"We are stopping operations for two main reasons," spokeswoman Victoria Zotikova told Reuters.
"The first is that our biggest concern is for the safety and security of our staff in the North Caucasus, and the second is that we are very concerned about Nina's fate and we want to show solidarity with her, her family and her organisation, which is a valued partner of the U.N."
Russian police were not immediately available for comment on the kidnapping.
Druzhba works with the U.N. children's fund UNICEF, running educational and social rehabilitation programmes for children affected by the conflict in Chechnya.
Zotikova said all humanitarian programmes would be suspended indefinitely in Chechnya, and also for two days in the neighbouring republic of Ingushetia, where some 150,000 Chechen refugees are seeking shelter from the war.
"The only exception being that water distribution in (the Chechen capital) Grozny will continue," she said. "This is indispensable for the survival of the local population."
THE KIDNAPPING BUSINESS
Chechnya won de facto independence from Russia after a 1994-1996 war. Kidnapping is rife in a region awash with arms, devastated by war and in the grip of feuding warlords.
President Vladimir Putin, then Russian prime minister, used the lawlessness to justify a second military intervention in the secessionist republic, which was launched in October 1999 and is still dragging on. Moscow now has shaky control over the rebel region and says the military part of its operation is over, but its troops are still killed almost daily in rebel ambushes.
Last year, the United Nations and other aid agencies suspended their Chechnya operations for more than a month after the kidnapping of Medecins Sans Frontieres relief worker Kenny Gluck in January. He was released unharmed 25 days later.
No ransom demand was made during the American's captivity. He said his abductors had called the kidnapping a mistake, but Russia's FSB domestic security police said they had released Gluck in a "special operation."
Many aid agencies now do not let international staff live in Chechnya, but only to travel there from neighbouring provinces.
Zotikova said a U.N. delegation was travelling to Chechnya to hold discussions with Moscow's local authorities in the capital Grozny on Davidovich's kidnapping.
"We are hoping for a positive solution to the problem and we are in permanent contact with the authorities in Moscow and in the North Caucasus," she said.