Federal forces still seeking Ruslan Gelayev’s fightersRuslan Isayev, North Caucasus - The search operations in Chechnya aiming to trace the troops led by Chechen field commander Ruslan (Khamzat) Gelayev continue. The federal military forces withdrawn from all the republic’s regions to the Achkhoy-Martan and Urus-Martan districts started surrounding villages where Chechen fighters are expected to appear.
One of the first villages to be searched by the federal servicemen was Komsomolskoye. The special operation, referred to as a “mopping-up operation”, has already been running for three days. The village is completely and thoroughly blockaded by army vehicles – no one is let in, nor out.
Search activities are carried out by paratroopers dropped from the helicopters circling above the village. Practically all males aged between 15 and 50 have to go through a passport check as well as a search for any signs of carrying a gun on themselves.
One of the local women named Malika who was prevented from going to the village yesterday reported seeing Russian soldiers beating other villagers in the outskirts of Komsomolskoye. Virtually all of the captured persons had T-shirts or shirts pulled over their heads, she says. The number of detainees is yet unknown.
The fact that Ruslan Gelayev himself comes from Komsomolskoye might be, according to its inhabitants, the reason behind the special operation. However, many of the locals are skeptical about Gelayev actually being found in their village. Instead, they indicate Bamut, a village in the southwest of Chechnya at the administrative border with Ingushetia, as his most likely whereabouts.
It was in Bamut where troops headed by Gelayev managed to sustain defense for rather a long period during the first Chechen war. In former times, the Soviet Army had its missile site next to this village. Later, the underground pits enabled the fighters to defend it.
(P/A,T) |
