Attackers raided a regional branch of the Federal Drug Control Service in the Kabardino-Balkaria republic [NB: this is just north of North Ossetia and east of Georgia, see area #5 on this map . AoS] before dawn Tuesday, shot and killed four employees, looted an arsenal and set the office ablaze, police said.
The assailants stole 36 Kalashnikov automatic rifles, 136 pistols and 1,500 rifle cartridges, said Alexei Polyansky, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry's branch in Rostov-on-Don. Six to 10 attackers were involved in the raid on the drug service building in Nalchik, the republic's capital, according to a preliminary investigation. It was not immediately clear who they were.
| We have to get tough with those Esquimaux. |
Interfax quoted Natalya Marshenkulova, spokeswoman for the drug agency's regional office, as saying the attackers handcuffed the four employees -- three officers and a driver -- and led them into a basement, where they shot them.
| The m.o. sounds rather suspiciously like the Lions of Islam™, doesn't it? |
Polyansky said it was unclear how the attackers had gained entry to the building, which they apparently entered without firing a shot.
| Carded the door latch with a Pakistani passport? |
The first that law enforcement agencies heard of the attack was a telephone call around 5 a.m. from a man who reported he saw smoke pouring out of the drug agency office's windows, Itar-Tass reported.
Investigators were considering two motives for the attack: revenge by a drug baron or a hunt for weapons. State television said the agency had interrupted a key drug route through Kabardino-Balkaria in the last month, but officials played down that version. "According to a preliminary scenario, the reason for the attack was an attempt to seize a large cache of weapons. In my opinion, such an amount was seized not for sale but for arming some bands," said Alexander Mikhailov, spokesman for the Federal Drug Control Service. "I don't rule out the possibility that some former employees took part [in the raid] or that those who were inside the building knew someone among the attackers."
Itar-Tass quoted unidentified Federal Security Service officers in Kabardino-Balkaria as saying the attackers could be members of Yarmuk, a radical Islamic group loyal to Chechen rebel leader Shamil Basayev, which has been targeted by law enforcement agencies in the republic. |
