Bombings and Shooting Reported in Dagestan and Kabardino-Balkaria

Insurgency-related violence continued during the last several days in the aftermath of clashes between security forces and rebels in Chechnya’s southern Vedeno district, during which three servicemen and a policeman were killed. During a security sweep in the Dagestani cities of Makhachkala and Kaspiisk, 15 suspected insurgents were killed (EDM, September 30).

A suspected rebel was killed in a shootout with security forces in Makhachkala, Dagestan’s capital, today (October 1). According to security officials, the incident took place after the suspect was surrounded in an apartment building and put up “armed resistance.” The slain insurgent was identified as Naib Nasirov, a wanted member of “the Khasavyurt gang underground” who, according to the National Anti-Terrorism Committee, had organized and directly participated in an attempt to kill a Dagestani city official. Nasirov was reportedly armed with an assault rifle with a mounted grenade launcher. A Dagestani law-enforcement source was quoted as saying that one of two armored personnel carriers that arrived at the scene of the operation was hit by a bomb blast. None of its crew was hurt, but the armored personnel carrier (APC) was damaged, the source said (www.newsru.com, www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, October 1).

On September 29, 17 policemen were injured when a bomb went off on a road near Kaspiisk as they were conducting checks of cars traveling along the road. Eight of the injured policemen were hospitalized, two of them in serious condition. The explosion reportedly had the force of 200 grams of TNT (Interfax, www.mn.ru, www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, September 30).

Gunmen in the Dagestani city of Izberbash shot and killed the head of the local branch of the Interior Ministry’s Anti-Extremism Center, Ramazan Radzhabov, and three others on September 28. According to the Investigative Committee, the attackers targeted Radzhabov, his deputy and three other people. One of the five was wounded but survived the attack. That same day, a homemade bomb went off in Makhachkala near Dagestan State Pedagogical University. No one was hurt in the blast (www.kavkaz.uzel.ru, September 28).

On September 26, unidentified gunmen shot a policeman, Rasul Magomedov, along with his wife and daughter, outside of their home in village of Leninkent in Dagestan’s Karabudakhkentsky district. Magomedov, who had been awarded the Order of Courage several days earlier, and his daughter were killed (www.kavkaz.uzel.ru, September 27). On the evening of September 25, someone threw a grenade onto the roof of a store in the village of Khebda in Dagestan’s Shamilsky district. No one was hurt in the blast, which slightly damaged the store (www.kavkaz.uzel.ru, September 26).

In Kabardino-Balkaria, the director of the local branch of Sberbank in the city of Tyrnyauz was shot to death today (October 1) by a group of attackers who, according to a local law-enforcement source, were wearing camouflage uniforms in order to appear to be policemen. The incident took place in the village of Kendelen. On the evening of September 30, unidentified gunmen fired on a highway police (DPS) vehicle near the village of Atazhukino in Kabardino-Balkaria’s Baksan district, wounding two policemen (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, October 1). A roadside bomb blast in Nalchik on September 29 wounded a policeman and his driver (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, September 30).

On September 28, security forces discovered two improvised explosive devices (IED’s) in the center of Nalchik and destroyed them in controlled explosions (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, September 28).

On September 25, a remote-controlled explosive device employing a grenade detonated outside the local affiliate of the Russian Interior Ministry’s Krasnodar Law Institute in Nalchik. The blast resulted in no casualties of or damage (Interfax, September 25).

In Ingushetia, police defused an IED in the town of Karabulak on September 29 (Interfax, September 29). On September 27, unidentified gunmen attacked a border guard unit located in the center of the republic’s main city, Nazran. The attackers fired automatic rifles and grenade launchers, but no one was hurt in the attack. On September 26, gunmen attacked a police post in the Ingush village of Yandare, killing one policeman (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, September 28).

On September 25, members of an OMON special police unit from Chelyabinsk Oblast deployed in Ingushetia came under fire along the Malgobek-Zyazikov-Sagopshi road. One of their vehicles was damaged but no one was hurt in the attack (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, September 25).

Meanwhile, two car bombs were discovered and defused in the southern Russian city of Stavropol on September 30. Two apartment buildings and a school were evacuated in the southwestern part of the city after the discovery of the first car, containing a corpse and an explosive device. The second car bomb was found a short time later. A security source told RIA Novosti today (October 1) that the car bombs were made out of aluminum powder and nitrate fertilizer and that each had an explosive force equivalent to 30 kilograms of TNT. A bomb in Stavropol on May 26 killed eight people and injured more than 30.