GROZNY. March 3 (Interfax-AVN) - Federal forces in Chechnya have thwarted an attempt by rebels to smuggle an Igla shoulder- fired anti-aircraft missile into Grozny, Colonel Ilya Shabalkin, a spokesman for the regional headquarters of the anti-guerilla campaign in the North Caucasus, told Interfax on Monday.
The rebels planned to smuggle the Igla into the vicinity of the Khankala military base and try to shoot down a military helicopter on March 23, the day of the Chechen constitutional referendum, Shabalkin said.
He said they obtained this information from residents of the Vedeno district. The rebels tried to deliver the missile to Grozny in a rented van, which was stopped on the road to the city, Shabalkin said.
A certain Apti Movladov, whose radio call sign is Abu Khalid, was detained. Another person who accompanied the cargo was preliminarily identified as Abu Mohammed, an Arab, Shabalkin said. That man was seriously wounded when he resisted arrest, and died of bleeding despite medical aid.
"Movladov said at the preliminary interrogation that he and his accomplice were subordinated to notorious rebel ringleader Abu al-Valid," Shabalkin said.
Movladov said they had been ordered to deliver the missile to the Grozny rural district and hide it in direct proximity to Khankala, Shabalkin noted.