NIZHNY NOVGOROD. Aug 23 (Interfax-AVN) - An officer of the Interior Ministry troops was killed in the Chechen town of Argun overnight to Friday.
Captain Maxim Smirnov was deputy commander of a reconnaissance company organic to the separate operations brigade of the troops' Volga district, chief of the district's press service Lieutenant Colonel Igor Sofronov told Interfax-Military News Agency. He was wounded in the head in an engagement with a rebel gang.
The officer was delivered to the military hospital in Khankala by helicopter and died there at 3:00 Moscow time (2300 GMT), Sofronov said.
No other federals were hurt in the engagement. Losses among guerrillas are being calculated, Sofronov said.