CHECHNYA ROUNDUP.

The spokesman for the Russian military command in Chechnya announced September 3 that Dudayev’s forces had opened fire on Russian posts 19 times during the weekend, and that four Russian soldiers were killed during the firefights. A spokesman for Chechen president Jokhar Dudaev told Russia’s Radio September 3 that, during the weekend, Russian artillery in Grozny shelled Chechen positions several times.

The Russian-Chechen joint armistice commission’s co-chairmen, Lt. General. Anatoly Romanov and Chechen chief of staff Aslan Maskhadov, announced in Grozny that they discussed exchanging 14 Russian prisoners of war for 145 Chechen fighters captured by Russian troops. Maskhadov added that he promised Romanov that there would be no Chechen military activities on the fourth anniversary of Chechen independence, September 4 and 5; but he cautioned that he could only speak for the units under his control.

The Russian Internal Affairs Ministry’s spokesman in Chechnya said that disarmament of Chechen forces is proceeding very slowly, and that Chechen forces so far had handed over only 1,100 weapons out of some 70,000 believed to be in their hands. Moskovsky komsomolets reported September 3 that the disarmament process has become quite profitable for both Chechen and Russian troops. Russian servicemen are selling their weapons cheaply to Chechen units about to be disarmed, while the latter hand their weapons over to the joint armistice control commission for the stipulated reward of up to 1 milllion rubles, sharing the profits with the salesman. In this way, the disarmament of Chechen military formation may continue on paper until the funds allotted by the government for this operation are exhausted.

Lapshin Clashes with Chernomyrdin on Land Referendum.