What happened in Chechnya over past few days

The Russian defence ministry's reconnaissance group has run into an ambush in Chechnya's Kurchaloi district. One man was wounded, a source in the headquarters of the Unified Group of Federal Forces in the North Caucasus told RIA Novosti.

A group of Russian scouts came under militant fire in a forest yesterday. Captain Sergei Ukrainsky, a company commander, was injured in the skirmish and hospitalised.

Federal forces destroyed a base, which belonged to a militant group led by Denilbek Alkhazurov, the press centre of the Regional Headquarters for the Counter-terrorist Operation in the North Caucasus told RIA Novosti on Monday.

The militant base was located in a forest near the village of Kurdyukovsky. There was a dugout to accommodate 10 fighters and two tourist tents at the base.

Federal forces examined the base, performed relevant investigation procedures and blew up the base.

Search for the Alkhazurov-led group is under way, reports the headquarters.

Lieutenant Khamid Khadzhiyev, commander of the patrol battalion of Shali's police, came under fire yesterday at about 7 p.m. Moscow time, a duty officer at the interior department of the Shali district, told RIA Novosti. Gunmen in camouflage uniforms fired at the policeman from sub-machine guns when he arrived at a filling station not far from his home. The policeman died on the spot. Police are searching for the criminals.

The duty officer said that was not the first time Mr. Khadzhiyev had come under fire, but denied further details.

Mr. Khadzhiyev's brother, Akhmed, who served in the police force in the Oktyabrsky district, was killed in a blast two years ago, the Chechen Interior Ministry told RIA Novosti.

Khamid Khadzhiyev's another brother, Ruslan, died when terrorists blew up the government buildings in Grozny on December 27, 2002. Ruslan Khadzhiyev worked as an inspector at the republic's Finance Ministry, according to the ministry.

Three teenagers found a half dug bomb and tried to pull it out. The blast that ensued killed two and gravely wounded one of the teenagers, reports the headquarters.

A similar incident took place in the village of Kurchaloi yesterday. Three teenagers found an explosive in a deserted house and tried to take it out when it detonated. One of the boys was killed the others were injured.

According to the press service of the North Caucasus Frontier Department of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), the Argun border-guard unit and the Itum Kali department of Chechnya's Interior Ministry conducted the first joint raid in the mountains on the Chechen section of the Russo-Georgian border at the weekend.

They found a cache and grenades, fuses and ammunition nearby not far from the Ushkaloi village. A total of over a dozen grenades of different types and some 400 small arms cartridges were found during the raid.

Caches containing 1,200 rounds of ammunition have been destroyed at the Chechen section of the border since the start of 2004.