Four militants allegedly planning a series of terrorist attacks in the republic of Chechnya have been killed in a counterterrorism raid, Russia’s National Antiterrorism Committee (NAC) said Tuesday.
The counterterrorism operation in the Chechen capital of Grozny was ordered by regional Federal Security Service (FSB) head Igor Kochnev in order to suppress «possible terrorist acts,» the NAC said. It involved officers from the security forces, National Guard and police.
“The criminals were barricaded inside a private residence. In response to the security forces’ offer to surrender, they opened fire with automatic weapons,” the NAC statement said.
Three law enforcement officers were killed in the shootout in addition to the four suspected terrorists.
Security forces have seized weapons, ammunition and communication equipment from the residence.
The suspected militants had arrived in Chechnya from abroad, Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov wrote on his official Telegram channel.
“Security forces knew in advance that members of illegal armed groups had arrived in the region from abroad. … Local residents also helped in uncovering the cell, informing security forces of suspicious individuals in one of the residences,” said Kadyrov.
Kadyrov later added that the four suspects were originally from Grozny and had been “on the run” in Syria and other countries before returning to Chechnya to “plot terrorist attacks on orders from the West.”
The Islamic State terror group has claimed responsibility for a series of attacks in recent years in Chechnya, a predominately Muslim republic in Russia’s North Caucasus region. An estimated 3,400 Russians fought in Syria and Iraq on the side of Islamic State and around 400 have returned home.
Armenia and Azerbaijan accuse each other of violating new Nagorno-Karabakh truce
Armenia and Azerbaijan accused each other on Sunday of violating a new humanitarian ceasefire in fighting over the mountain enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh, hours after it was agreed.
The truce agreed on Saturday came into force at midnight (2000 GMT) after a week-old Russian-brokered ceasefire failed to halt the worst fighting in the South Caucasus since the 1990s.
The Armenian defence ministry said the Azeri army had fired twice during the night and used artillery.
The Azeri defence ministry said: “The enemy fired at the vicinity of the Jabrail city, as well as the villages of this region … using mortars and artillery”. It added that the Azeri army “took adequate retaliatory measures”.
Officials in Nagorno-Karabakh said Azeri forces had launched an attack on the enclave’s military positions and there were casualties and wounded on both sides.
Nagorno-Karabakh is a mountain territory that is internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan but populated and governed by ethnic Armenians.
The ceasefire earlier this month was aimed at letting the sides swap detainees and bodies of those killed in the clashes, but it had little impact on the fighting around the enclave.
The new truce was announced on Saturday after Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov talked to his Armenian and Azeri counterparts by phone and called on sides to observe the truce that he mediated a week ago.
Russia, France and the United States belong to the Minsk Group, which has attempted to help resolve the conflict under the umbrella of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
Baku said on Saturday that 60 Azeri civilians had been killed and 270 wounded since the fighting flared on 27 September. It has not disclosed its military casualties.
Nagorno-Karabakh says 633 of its military personnel have been killed, and 36 civilians.
