GUNFIRE intensified as night fell in the Chechen capital Grozny tonight where Russian troops mounted ``search and destroy'' missions against rebel fighters who attacked and occupied parts of the city.
The sky over the war-torn city glowed orange with what local people said was a blaze at an oil dump south of the city. Officials said it would take several more days to remove the rebels.
Sniper and automatic gunfire and more powerful blasts echoed across the city centre, some 500yd from the Moscow-backed government's headquarters.
After three days of battles with fighters loyal to separatist leader Dzhokhar Dudayev, Russian armoured vehicles, including at least one T-72 tank, stood guard near the building as soldiers tried to flush out the rebels.
``The situation is extremely tense,'' said a Chechen Interior Ministry commander.
Russian television, in the first footage broadcast from the area since Wednesday's rebel attack, quoted the Interior Ministry as saying: ``The situation is totally under control.''
However, Ruslan Zakayev, secretary of the pro-Moscow Chechen government's security council, said: ``The situation in Grozny is difficult . . . Part of the city has been seized and is controlled by Dudayev's fighters.''
Rebels, whose numbers were difficult to estimate, had taken areas in the south-east, west, and north-west of the city.
``The government's response will be of the toughest order. Strong measures will be taken to push out and liquidate the fighters,'' he said.
Asked how long this operation would take, he said: ``For this we need several days.''
Tass reported heavy fighting between the ruins of the presidential palace and Minutka Square. It later said Russian forces had driven rebels out of Minutka.
However it said Russian troops were struggling to relieve a command post in the Zavodskoi region of south-west Grozny, which was coming under fire from surrounding rebels.
``The situation is continually changing,'' said Ruslan Martagov, spokesman for the Chechen government.
He described the federal troops as frightened and overstressed, and said some had fired on local policemen.
However General Nikolai Tkachev, Russian military chief-of-staff in Chechnya, told Interfax that the situation was stabilising, though tense in southern areas as rebels sought to escape.
Russian forces, including elite paratroops, have suffered some of their heaviest casualties of the 15-month Chechen conflict since rebels launched their bold raid on Grozny.
About 70 Russian Interior Ministry troops had been killed and 160 wounded in the fighting, while about 40 servicemen were missing. There were no details of civilian or rebel casualties. -Reuter.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article