SHOOTOUTS ALSO REPORTED IN NORTH OSSETIA AND INGUSHETIA

Several attacks reportedly took place in North Ossetia and Ingushetia this past week. A Russian army officer was wounded when a group of unknown persons attempted to penetrate a Russian military base on the outskirts of the village of Alkhan-Churt, located 15 kilometers from Vladikavkaz, on January 4. Interfax quoted an unnamed military spokesman as saying the intruders pulled up to a base checkpoint in a Volga car and tried to enter the restricted area by foot. “When the guards tried to stop the illegal trespassing, one of the intruders took out a pistol and shot at an officer,” the spokesman said. The attackers escaped from the scene, but one of them, the driver of the car, was later arrested by local police. “The man who opened fire has been identified, and the police are searching for him,” the spokesman said.

A shootout reportedly took place in neighboring Ingushetia on January 9. The Ingushetiya.ru website reported that the incident took place in Nazran when two rebels in a Vaz automobile fired at policemen and tried to escape. According to police, when pursuing law-enforcement officials stopped the Vaz on the outskirts of the village of Verkhniye Achaluki in Ingushetia’s Malgobeksky district, the rebels blew themselves up with a grenade. An Ingush Interior Ministry source told the website that a large number of arms and ammunition had been found on the dead rebels, and that no Interior Ministry personnel were hurt in the incident. Police at the scene said the gunmen were probably “locals.”

On the same day, an F-1 grenade attached to a wire was found under a gas pipeline near School No. 9 in Nazran’s Altievo municipal district, Kavkazky Uzel reported. A law-enforcement source stated that the explosive device was placed under a gas pipeline located just a few dozen meters from the school as well as a guard-post of the DPS (Road Patrol Service) of the Ingush police. The explosive device was defused by bomb disposal experts. On January 8, unknown attackers fired a grenade launcher at a local police headquarters in the Ingush village of Troitskaya. No one was hurt in the incident.