TROUBLE IN DAGESTAN.

The Dagestan republic’s Internal Affairs Ministry (MVD) and Russia’s Federal Security Service announced January 5 the arrest of four Russian border troops caught in the act of ferrying a truckload of ammunition and arms to Chechen forces. President Boris Yeltsin’s national security adviser Yuri Baturin said the incident prompted a decision to inspect all Russian border troop units to assess the security of their arms caches against theft. (14).

Dagestan ‘s MVD has acknowledged that protest rallies demanding the withdrawal of Russian troops from Chechnya have been taking place daily in Dagestan’s Chechen-inhabited Khasavyurt district. The district is situated near the border with Chechnya. The disclosure was prompted by the killing of two ministry officers in the area. (15). To date, republican authorities loyal to Moscow have managed to keep the situation in Dagestan and elsewhere largely under control.

Moscow Holds Firm On Kurile Islands.