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Maria Turchenkova / Reuters
A woman walks along a road in the settlement of Akhty in southern Dagestan, July 4, 2012. All photos made available to NBC News on August 31, 2012.
Maria Turchenkova / Reuters
Salafi preacher Abdurakhim Magomedov gives an interview at his house in the village of Novosasitli, July 13, 2012. Magomedov, a charismatic Salafi preacher whose video sermons are popular on the Internet, says that while Dagestan is not yet ready for jihad, its Muslim population must not live under secular law and Russian rule.
Reuters reports — Little girls in hijabs peek out of tin-roof houses and boys play at "cops and insurgents" in the narrow dirt streets.
At one end of the village of Gimry men are building a new, red-brick madrassa, one of many religious schools springing up across Dagestan, a region in the high Caucasus mountains on Russia's southern fringe, in the throes of an Islamic revival.
More than a dozen young men from the village have "gone to the forest" - the local euphemism for joining insurgents in their hideouts, says village administrator Aliaskhab Magomedov.
"It's a full-fledged jihad," he said. "They don't recognize my authority." Read the full story.
Maria Turchenkova / Reuters
Young men and boys pose for a picture in a street in the village of Gimry, July 9, 2012.
Maria Turchenkova / Reuters
Men build a new madrassa, a religious school, in the village of Gimry, July 9, 2012.
Maria Turchenkova / Reuters
Young Salafi women spend time at a public women's beach in downtown Makhachkala, Dagestan's capital, July 8, 2012. "Five years ago, there were no Islamic clothing shops. Now every other girl wears a hijab," said Fatima Ramzanova, 19, feet curled under her on the sand of a new women-only beach in a full, black Islamic dress she wears against her mother's wishes.
Maria Turchenkova / Reuters
A local resident shows her house, which was seriously damaged during a special antiterrorist operation conducted by the Russian military forces in a building nearby, in the town of Kaspiysk, July 10, 2012.
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