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| Caucasus |
| Terrorist attack on Chechen mufti thwarted |
| 2004-07-19 |
| Chechen law-enforcement agencies have prevented an attempt on the life of Chechen Mufti Akhmed-Khadzhi Shamayev, a Russian military spokesman told Interfax on Monday. An improvised explosive device was discovered near the mufti's home not far from the village of Vashindaroi in the Shatoi district, spokesman for the anti-terrorist headquarters in the North Caucasus Ilya Shabalkin said. The bomb had been planted a long distance from the federal convoys' route, which suggests that it was intended for Shamayev, he said. Earlier, rebels killed Shamayev's son in the same village, Shabalkin added. The Chechen Interior Ministry told Interfax that a group of unidentified armed assailants wearing camouflage stopped a motor vehicle belonging to the Chechen government's energy committee and stole it. A search has been launched to detain the assailants. Armed rebels shot a resident of the village of Stariye Atagi in the Groznenski district as he was returning home from a local mosque on Sunday evening. The motive behind the murder has not been established yet. Also in the Groznenski district, armed assailants broke into the home of a woman in the village of Pervomaiskaya and stole 97,000 rubles. Large-scale operations to find weapons and ammunition are continuing in Grozny and in several villages. Separate districts are also being checked. Control has been tightened over approaches to Grozny, the Interior Ministry said. According to Shabalkin, a group of about 15 rebels attacked residents of the village of Guni in the Vedeno district, stealing food, cash and other valuables. Four rebel groups have been eliminated in Chechnya over the past 24 hours. Twenty-one rebels have been killed in fighting. Three of them had attempted to cross into Dagestan, Shabalkin said. He said that operations to detain rebels are continuing in Chechnya and in Ingushetia. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |