Medvedev supports idea of Council of Elders in North Caucasus.

MOSCOW, May 20 (Itar-Tass) -- President Dmitry Medvedev approved the
idea of creating a Council of the Elders in the North Caucasus.
The author of the idea is Ella Pamfilova, chairwoman of the
Presidential Council for the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights
Institutions.
"It would be absolutely reasonable to create such a council in the
North Caucasus," the president said. "We should think how to use the
experience of the elders in practice."
"Gathering the elders is no problem, but we should understand how to
apply it in practice," he noted.
Medvedev also supported the idea of grants for small business in the
North Caucasus.
Pamfilova believes that such practice might prove useful when
attracting young people to small business. "We might borrow this positive
experience from Dagestan," she said.
According to Federation Council member Aslan Aslakhanov, the idea of
creating an all-Caucasian council of the elders "can work".
"In the past all important issues in the Caucasus were solved by the
elders. The creation of the institute of the elders can help to stabilise
the situation in the North Caucasus and solve a number of problems such as
inter-ethnic, inter-confessional and everyday ones," he said.
"It is also important that young people will have someone to turn to
for advice, and the elders will be able to engage in preventive work,
which is so necessary nowadays," Aslakhanov said.
In his opinion, the future council should involve "truly worthy people
who are guided in their work primarily by conscience."