Russian troops comb city for militants
(AP)
Updated: 2005-10-15 10:31

Rebels for years have harassed Russian forces in Chechnya with roadside bombs and homemade explosives but the Nalchik attacks appeared to be part of a strategy to target areas outside the volatile republic and keep Moscow off-balance.

Russian officials said the 2002 seizure of hundreds of people in a Moscow theater, the 2004 school hostage-taking in the southern city of Beslan that killed 330 and other terror attacks were conducted by the Chechen militants with support and guidance from the al-Qaida.

However, no firm evidence exists suggesting the two groups are coordinating their strategies.

Chechen insurgents like Shamil Basayev — the main warlord in Chechnya's decade-old fight against Russian forces — have long infiltrated republics like Kabardino-Balkariya in the mostly Muslim region. Hoping to destabilize state authority, they buy off corrupt officials to get weapons and unleash terrorist bombings or hit-and-run attacks against the police.

The Nalchik attacks came amid a long-running regional campaign aimed at undermining nascent Islamic extremism. Human rights lawyers say the campaign has also affected innocent, peaceful young Muslims, alienating and offending them as they rediscover their Muslim heritage.

In the wake of Thursday's daylight, more than three dozen people — mostly men, mostly Muslim — have been caught up in the police dragnet looking for participants and conspirators in the assault that once again underscored the volatility of the Caucasus region.

Tensions are running high in Kabardino-Balkiriya republic, where poverty is grinding, corruption is endemic and the violence stemming from nearby, war-wracked Chechnya is spilling over with increasing frequency.

The provincial president, Arsen Kanokov, blamed the attack on social conditions, which rebels have exploited to recruit and bolster their ranks.

"The population's low income and unemployment create the soil for religious extremists and other destructive forces to conduct an ideological war against us," Kanokov was quoted by Interfax as saying.

Bloodied bodies from Thursday's fighting still lay in the streets on Friday. A man's body lay near the entrance to police station No. 2 and the regional anti-terrorist center, where most of the windows had been blown out. Across the street sprawled seven more bodies, most with horrific head injuries.

As security forces swept through the city, soldiers shot grenades through the barred window of a gift shop in the town center and used an armored personnel carrier to smash through the shop wall to save two hostages. Three militants were killed there, Deputy Prosecutor General Vladimir Kolesnikov said.

Authorities elsewhere rescued four police officers from gunmen who had taken them along in a van in a getaway attempt, Deputy Interior Minister Andrei Novikov said. The militants were killed.

At least 108 people, including 72 attackers, were killed in this week's fighting, according to a tally of accounts by officials, news reports and an Associated Press reporter. Twenty-four law enforcement officers were killed and 51 were wounded, Novikov said.

Amid conflicting casualty tolls, the regional department of the Emergency Situations Ministry said 18 civilians had been killed and 139 wounded, ministry duty officer Sergei Petrov said. Other reports had put the number of civilian dead at 12.