STAVROPOL. Feb 20 (Interfax) - The Chechen Shatoi District Court has pronounced a sentence for Maxim Ponaryin, who was implicated in an attack on servicemen in 2000, the press service of the Federal Security Service Directorate for the Stavropol territory said.
"Ponaryin on the basis of Article 317 of the Russian Penal Code [encroachment on the life of servicemen] is sentenced to 13 years in a high-security penal colony. He was given a final cumulative sentence of life in a high-security penal colony by way of partial summation of punishments," the statement said.
According to the investigation theory, Ponaryin as a member of the united armed criminal ring under joint command of Basayev and Khattab was involved in the assault on servicemen of the sixth company of the 104th regiment of the 76th Pskov Airborne Troops division in the woody highlands in the Shatoi district of the Russian Republic of Chechnya on February 29, 2000.
The militants attacked from three sides, at this time, Ponaryin, having taken a position, was precision firing 5.45 mm Kalashnikov assault rifles against the servicemen. Eighty-four servicemen were killed; four suffered injuries of different degrees of severity in the battle, which lasted until the morning of March 1.
Furthermore, Stavropol resident Ponaryin was a member of Shamil Basayev's 'Nogai battalion' and "was involved in clashes with Russian federal troops in Chechnya," the Federal Security Service Directorate press service said.
In 2007, he was already sentenced to life in prison for complicity in the terrorist acts perpetrated in the Moscow metro in 2004, a string of explosions at public transport stops in Voronezh and Krasnodar in 2003-2004.