RUSSIA: More than 30 people have died in three days of fierce fighting, bomb attacks and ambushes in Chechnya, as Moscow's offer of a partial amnesty to the Russian region's rebels came into effect. Daniel McLaughlin reports
Military officials said yesterday that a string of clashes had killed at least 19 servicemen and 14 separatist fighters, whose leaders denounce as futile Moscow's efforts to end its second war in Chechnya since 1994.
Masked gunmen killed Mr Abdullah Arsanukayev, the deputy head of Chechnya's natural gas network, in his home on Sunday, in the highest-profile killing of a violent weekend. It underlined rebels' refusal to accept a disputed March referendum result that the Kremlin says proved Chechens' desire to remain part of the Russian Federation.
Russian officials said at least four soldiers and 14 rebels had died in more than a day of fighting in the eastern Chechen town of Argun, where rebels ambushed a military truck at the weekend.
Two pro-Russian policemen died yesterday in a bombing in southeastern Chechnya, the rebels' mountainous stronghold. Four more servicemen were shot dead in the region's shattered capital, Grozny, and attacks around the republic killed at least nine other soldiers and policemen since Friday, officials said.
The upsurge in violence followed the approval by Russian parliamentarians of a partial amnesty for rebels willing to lay down arms by September 1st.
Moscow says it is a key step towards establishing peace in Chechnya, but critics say it will have little effect because it does not cover anyone accused of "serious" crimes, including trying to kill Russian soldiers. It also offers clemency to Russian servicemen, whom rights groups and civilians accuse of persistent abuses.
Military officials in Chechnya said yesterday that 28 people had handed over their weapons since Friday, and insisted that the amnesty was sowing discord among rebel groups.
Moscow says Chechnya's rebels are increasingly funded and influenced by international terrorist groups.
Russia's FSB security service said yesterday it had arrested in Moscow 121 supporters of the Islamic Liberation Party, a group banned here for allegedly trying to foment Islamic revolution in ex-Soviet Central Asia.
