A drunk Russian soldier shot dead a Chechen bus driver and wounded four of his
passengers in the latest breakdown of army discipline in the rebel region,
Itar-Tass news agency reported on Wednesday. It said the soldier opened
fire on the civilian bus on Tuesday on the road from the capital Grozny
to Chechnya's second city of Gudermes.
"Military prosecutors and civil prosecutors have opened a criminal case. The drunk
soldier has been arrested," Tass quoted a spokesman for the administration
in Grozny as saying. In November a Russian border guard high on hallucinogenic
mushrooms killed five comrades in a shooting spree on the border with Georgia,
just south of war-torn Chechnya.
Tales of substance abuse are frequent in the Russian army, where brutality
and desertions are commonplace. Every male between 18 and 27 is obliged
to spend two years in the cash-strapped force, though a bill passed over
the summer will allow young men to chose non- military service over the draft.