10 killed in Chechnya

May 27, 2003 Posted: 18:20 Moscow time (14:20 GMT)

VLADIKAVKAZ - Heavy fighting across Chechnya killed at least 10 Russian servicemen and injured 20, while an explosion that rocked a cafe injured four civilians, Chechen officials said Tuesday.

Chechnya's Emergency Situations Ministry said police were searching for a man who entered an Urus-Martan cafe dressed in a police uniform and left behind a plastic bag filled with explosives. The explosion injured three women and a 9-year-old child, officials said. All were hospitalized.

The attack, following recent deadly suicide bombings, prompted Chechen officials to urge extra vigilance amid warnings that the summer might see an increase in rebel strikes.

Throughout Chechnya, rebels attacked federal positions 14 times over the last 24 hours, killing four soldiers and wounding two, an official in the Moscow-backed Chechen administration said.

Rebels also clashed with federal soldiers near Agish-Batoi, engaging Russian troops in an hourlong shootout, the official said on condition of anonymity. Three servicemen were killed and 10 wounded, before the rebels disappeared back inside the thick forests. Helicopters were dispatched to pursue the rebels from the air.

An armored personnel carrier was blown up near Prigorodnoye, killing three soldiers and wounding eight. A civilian driver in a separate vehicle was also killed, the Chechen official said.

Chechen police - often targeted by rebels for their perceived links with Moscow - also came under attack. A police officer was killed in the Chechen capital Grozny, and four were wounded when rebels ambushed their convoy near Prigorodnoye, the Chechen official said.

Russian aviation pounded suspected rebel positions, and federal troops rounded up 200 people on suspicion of rebel ties.

Meanwhile, Chechen Prosecutor Vladimir Kravchenko was quoted as telling the Interfax news agency that an explosion that ruptured a natural gas pipeline Monday was caused by a technical failure and wasn't a terrorist act.

"We tend to believe there was no act of sabotage in this case," Kravchenko was quoted as saying. "It burst as a result of worn-out equipment."

The pipeline delivers natural gas to the neighboring Russian province of Dagestan and the ex-Soviet republic of Azerbaijan further south. Azerbaijan's national gas company, Azerigaz, said repairs would take at least four days.

/The Associated Press/