Police uncover huge underground arms cache in Russia's Dagestan Moscow | Sunday, Jan 16 2011 IST
Police uncovered a huge underground arms cache in the west of Russia's volatile North Caucasus republic of Dagestan, a spokesman for the Republic's Interior Ministry said today.
The arms cache was discovered late yesterday in the village of Yaryk-su of the Novolaksky district near a local cemetery. The hideout contained Kalashnikov assault rifles, grenades and a large amount of cartridges, the spokesman told RIA Novosti.
According to preliminary information, the hideout belonged to the militants who had been killed by police in May 2010 in a special security sweep, the spokesman said.
Attacks on police and officials are frequent in Russia's volatile North Caucasus republics, including Chechnya, Dagestan and Ingushetia as the federal authorities have been clamping down on militant groups while stepping up efforts to boost the local economies.
Car bomb attack in Dagestan a terrorist act: Russian Investigators Moscow | Saturday, Jan 15 2011 IST
Russian investigators today classified as a terrorist act an explosion near a cafe in the volatile North Caucasus republic of Dagestan near Chechnya, which killed at least three people and injured five others.
A car bomb was detonated yesterday evening near the cafe, killing at least three people and injuring other five who have all been hospitalised. According to the investigative report, two of the injured are in serious condition.
The vehicle was parked outside the cafe approximately one hour before the blast occurred. Investigators say the blast was equivalent to 15-20 kg of Trinitrotoluene (TNT), RIA Novosti reported.
Two of the three killed in the blast have been identified and investigators are trying to determine the exact number of injured.
Dagestan made the greatest contribution to the general trend of destabilization in the North Caucasus in 2010. Out of 178 deaths in terror attacks in the North Caucasus and Moscow in 2010, 68 occurred in or originated from Dagestan (38 percent). A total of 112 terrorist attacks, including 5 suicide explosions, took place in Dagestan in 2010. In addition, the two blasts in the Moscow metro that shook Russia on March 29 were widely attributed to Dagestani insurgents (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, January 7, 2011). Following the attack on the Baksan hydroelectric power plant in Kabardino-Balkaria on July 21, the Irganai hydroelectric plant in Dagestan was attacked on September 7. The Irganai plant’s owner, the Russian monopoly Rusgidro, promised to repair and re-launch the plant sometime in 2011 (www.riadagestan.ru, December 8, 2010).
Window on Eurasia: Islamization of Daghestan Would Be Taking Place Even If Wahhabis Didn’t Exist, Experts Say
Paul Goble
Vienna, January 6 – Even if there were no Wahhabi militants, the most frequently used Russian designation for the radical and often violent Salafi trend in Islam, the Islamization of Daghestan would be taking place just as rapidly, according to a leading specialist on religion and nationality in Makhachkala. Eduard Urazayev, a former republic nationalities minister and now a Daghestani political scientist, told a visiting Russian journalist that the traditional Muslims in that North Caucasus republic and the Muslim Spiritual Directorates have many of the same goals as the Wahhabis but seek to realize them by legal means (rnns.ru/social/189676-nazad-v-srednevekove.html). And consequently, Uruzayev says,"even if there were no Wahhabis, the Islamization of Daghestan would be proceeded at top speed,” a conclusion that calls into question Moscow’s current approach of seeking to gain support ...
On January 1, the head of the criminal police department of Untsukul district, Magomedrasul Makachev, was gunned down in his own home. Untsukul is an area in the Dagestani mountains that is known for its strong Islamic traditions and formidable, unending fight against government forces (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, January 1). On December 26, eight insurgents were killed during a massive counterterrorist operation carried out jointly by Interior Ministry and Federal Security Service (FSB) forces in Makhachkala. Twenty-seven-year-old Magomed Sheikhov, who allegedly had the rebel rank of "emir of Makhachkala,” was among the slain militants (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, December 27, 2010). Two more suspected rebels were killed in Makhachkala in another police operation on January 4 (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, January 4).
Violence in Dagestan continued largely unabated following the large government-sponsored conference calling for peace in the republic that ...
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