Attempts to Recruit Teenagers to Carry out Terrorist Acts Staved off in Grozny

Residents of Chechnya's Grozny and Gudermes districts have staved off attempts on the part of militants to recruit children to stage terrorist attacks on the federal forces and the authorities, Ilya Shabalkin, a spokesman for the Regional Operational Headquarters for coordinating the counter-terrorist operation in the North Caucasus, reported on Tuesday.

In the village of Suvorov-Yurt, Chechnya's Gudermes district, locals turned out a "spokesman" for a bandit unit, who was offering their children money and trying to hire them to stage terrorist acts. According to Shabalkin's account, the parents turned to the district interior office, which detained the recruiter on the spot and is now interrogating him. The name of the recruiter is not named in the interests of the investigation, Shabalkin said.

In a separate development taking place on the outskirts of Meskety, a village in Chechnya's Vedeno district, law enforcers shot down a militant who had opened fire on them while they were trying to arrest him. The militant carried a Kalashnikov assault rifle and a stock of cartridges. He has not been identified yet, Shabalkin reported.