Briefs

– Gas Pipeline Hit in Kabardino-Balkaria

An explosion near the village of Elbrus in Kabardino-Balkaria put a gas pipeline out of commission, Kavkazky Uzel reported on September 6. The website quoted an unnamed source in the press center of the Southern Federal District branch of the federal Emergency Situations Ministry as saying that that preliminary data suggested the blast was caused by an explosive device. Kavkazky Uzel on September 5 quoted an “informed source” as saying that an explosion that took place on August 31 in the Kabardino-Balkarian city of Tyrnyauz was aimed at the local police headquarters. The blast caused no damage, nor was anybody hurt in the explosion.

– Militant Killed in Karachaevo-Cherkessia

The Federal Security Service (FSB) reported on September 5 that the rebel leader in the republic, identified as Abubakar, was killed. “On 5 September 2007, the Russian Federation FSB, during planned reconnaissance actions on the Russian-Georgian section of the state border in the Karachaevo-Cherkessia border guard detachment’s zone of responsibility, discovered two armed citizens who were moving in from the territory of the neighboring state (Georgia),” the FSB said in a statement. “During an attempt to detain them, the criminals put up fierce resistance and were destroyed.” One of the two alleged militants was identified as Rustan Ionov, a resident of the village of Psyzh in Karachaevo-Cherkessia who, according to the FSB, was the head of a “religious-extremist society” in Karachaevo-Cherkessia and was involved in organizing terrorist attacks in the republic. Automatic weapons, ammunition, anti-personnel mines, 15 kilograms of explosives, and bomb components and materials for making mines were reportedly found on the slain suspects.