Chechen power agents assert that people killed in Grozny prepared terror acts

The two guys and two girls, liquidated on October 22 in the course of a special operation, held in the Oktiabrskiy District of Chechen capital, were hiding in the house, where a small facility for manufacturing explosives was organized. This was reported by local power agencies.

The "Caucasian Knot" correspondent was informed by a source in law enforcement bodies of Chechnya that the casualties have been identified; power agents believe that the young men were members of the armed grouping of field commander Hussein Gakaev.

"They are Idris Olkhazurov, 22, Zelimkhan Batalov, 21, Khava Khasaeva, 21, and Eva Gaisumova, 20. Olkhazurov and Batalov were killed in a skirmish, while the girls blew themselves up by means of explosives," the source told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent. "There are all grounds to assume that they were preparing self-suicide terror acts. At survey of the house, two belts with explosive, also known as "shahid belts" and two Kalashnikovs were found.

According to the source, the house where the four militants were liquidated also had a mini-shop for making explosives.

The source has confirmed that Zelimkhan Batalov was a brother of terrorist-suicide bomber Ilyas Batalov who on August 21 blew himself up in the vicinity of the Pervomaiskaya Street, Leninskiy District of Grozny (then, two militiamen were lost, and another employee of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) and an occasional woman were wounded - comment of the "Caucasian Knot"). "In the yesterday's special operation one militiaman from the Grozny District Interior Division was lost; there were no other victims or casualties in the special operation," said the source.

President of Chechnya Ramzan Kadyrov, who personally visited the place of the armed clash, has also stated that power agents managed to liquidate a group of potential suicide bombers. "This special operation has allowed preventing huge terror acts, which could lead to numerous victims among civilians," he said.

At the same time, in the opinion of many local residents, the recent unbelievable "productivity" of power agencies in conducting special operations against members of armed underground cannot but cause doubts. In Chechnya many people believe that power agents are posing earlier arrested or kidnapped persons as the militants liquidated in the course of their special operations. Naturally, it is highly difficult confirm or refute such statements.

However, an activist of one of human rights NGOs working in Chechnya told the "Caucasian Knot" that according to the MIA two militants had been liquidated in a special operation conducted in the Goity village, Urus-Martan District of Chechnya, on October 22. However, according to local residents, the armed clash was staged, and the casualties had no firearms - they were placed near the bodies of executed persons.

The republic's law enforcement bodies categorically refute this assertion. "Then, it turns out that in Goity law enforcers had also executed one of their colleagues and wounded two more? It's just an enormous stupidity," said the spokesman of the MIA of Chechnya, according to whom such statements can be made either by militants' relatives or by their helpers, who "try to blacken power agencies and agents."