Kommersant VLAST No. 35[336] - September 7, 1999

TERRORISM: The Chechen Trace

It is simply impossible to count the number of explosions thundering across the country. Even more numerous are the various explosive devices found in a wide variety of places that did not have time to explode. If a successful or unsuccessful explosion does not look like an outright criminal one, the authorities immediately talk about terror.

True, rarely has anyone taken responsibility for the terrorist attacks (with the exception of Salman Raduev, who at one time attributed all explosions to himself, and Komsomol extremists who blew up monuments to tsars), but it was taken for granted that it was the Chechens.

Law enforcement agencies managed to solve only three high-profile terrorist attacks, the perpetrators of which actually carried out the orders of Chechen field commanders Ruslan Khaikharoev and Salman Raduev. Teenagers worked for the former, women for the latter. The goal of the actions, as stated in the instructions seized from the militants, was:
* "to sow panic"
* "show the inability of the Russian authorities to control the situation"
* "increase tension in the region."

Historical Incidents

1977 Moscow Attack

• The first terrorist attack occurred in 1977 in Moscow.
• A bomb exploded in the Moscow metro.
• The explosives were hidden in a cast-iron roasting pan.
• Counterintelligence veterans found the organizers using a surviving piece of glass from a "Nairi" alarm clock as a timer mechanism, as fingerprints remained on the glass.
• The terrorists managed to detonate another bomb (on Nikolskaya Street) and planted a third, but the Chekists neutralized it.
  • Photo Note: The head of the press center of the UFSB for Moscow and the Moscow Region, Sergei Bogdanov, demonstrates a model of the explosive device in the roasting pan.

June 1996 Sabotage in Nalchik

• Khaikharoev ordered 17-year-old Akhmed Vorokov and his 16-year-old brother Ismagil to carry out sabotage in Nalchik.
• They planted a homemade bomb equivalent to 4 kg of TNT in a regular "Ikarus" bus on the Minvody—Nalchik—Vladikavkaz route.
• Additionally, the brothers mined:
  • The railway station of the city of Prokhladny (Kabardino-Balkaria).
  • A carriage of a local electric train.
• The bombs at the station and in the train did not go off, but six people died and 26 were injured in the bus explosion.
• The brothers were caught a few days later.
  • February 1997: Ismagil was sentenced to seven and a half years, and Akhmed to seven years in prison.

April 1997 Pyatigorsk Attack

• Raduev's subordinates, Chechen women Fatima Taimaskhanova and Aset Dadasheva, blew up the station in Pyatigorsk.
• Two people died and 22 were injured.
• Raduev promised the terrorists $50,000 each, but when they were caught by FSB officers a few days later, he did not give their relatives a penny.
• February of that year, a Stavropol court sentenced:
  • Taimaskhanova to 19 years.
  • Dadasheva to 16 years.
• Both were sent to serve their sentences in Vologda. (Note: There is a very strong Chechen diaspora there (15,000 people out of 400,000 residents), and the female saboteurs will not be in need while in the zone.)

Recent Developments

If a successful or unsuccessful explosion does not look like an outright criminal one, the authorities immediately talk about Chechen terror. True, rarely does any Chechen take responsibility for terrorist attacks.

• Two months ago, two more fighters from Raduev's group—Rustam Mezhiev and Ramazan Kozroev—went to the camps.
• By decision of the Supreme Court of North Ossetia, they received 15 years each for sabotage in the Prigorodny district of the republic.
• As part of a terrorist group commanded by an Ingush criminal "authority" and part-time officer of Raduev's army, Khasan Khadziev, Mezhiev and Kozroev mined roads near the village of Tarskoye.
• They were also supposed to take hostages from a nearby military unit, but Khadziev's detachment ran into the police and the military and was destroyed.
• Only Mezhiev and Kozroev escaped.
  • Mezhiev is serving his sentence in a camp near Saratov.
  • Kozroev is serving his sentence near Vladikavkaz.