9 Soldiers Slain by Rebels Found in Chechnya, Russia Says
Federal forces said Monday that they had found the bodies of nine Russian soldiers allegedly captured and executed by rebels in Chechnya after an ambush that undercut Moscow’s claims that the insurgents were near defeat.
The nine soldiers had been listed as missing after their Interior Ministry paramilitary unit was trapped in a rebel ambush March 29. The military command said Monday that the men were initially taken prisoner and later shot.
After weeks of searching, Russian troops found the bodies in two shallow graves in the Vedeno region in southern Chechnya on Sunday, said Gennady Alyokhin, chief spokesman of the military command in the Chechen capital, Grozny.
The bodies, some of which had been mutilated, were being examined by military pathologists, Alyokhin said on Russia’s NTV television.
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