[A pro-Kremlin Chechen serviceman of special forces unit stands on guard in Chechen capital Grozny. Read photo caption below].


SLEPTSOVSK, Russia (Islamweb & Agencies) - Russian occupation forces sweeping through villages near Chechnya's capital claim to have killed several Resistance men active in nearly two years of warfare, including one of the country's most wanted men.
In Ingushetia, on Chechnya's western border, a hunger strike to press demands for talks on ending the war drew more and more participants, with 82 refugees from the region refusing food.
About 1,000 others staged a demonstration in their support in the border town of Sleptsovsk.
Russian news agencies quoted Ilya Shabalkin, spokesman for the FSB security police force, as saying that Resistance chief Arbi Barayev had been among about 10 Resistance chiefs and other fighters killed in the drive near Grozny launched last Thursday.
An FSB spokesman, speaking by telephone in Moscow, said the reports were correct. He offered no further details.
President Vladimir Putin handed responsibility for the Chechnya operation earlier this year to the FSB. But mass withdrawals of Russian forces from Chechnya have been put on hold as Russian forces come under daily attack from Resistance forces.
Shabalkin had earlier said the military operation pushing through Alkhan-Kala and Kulary villages, on the southwest outskirts of the capital Grozny, was still under way and that the ''main core'' of Barayev's Resistance group had been killed.
But he had denied that Barayev was among the dead.
The Resistance Web site kavkaz.tsentr made no mention of Barayev or the operation. It said fighters had intensified attacks on Russian forces in Grozny and other areas, with 12 servicemen killed in two assaults on armored vehicles in the capital.
Past Russian reports of the deaths of Resistance chiefs have often proved false.
The death of Barayev, for years described by Moscow as the ringleader of kidnapping gangs that terrorized southern Russia, would be a major victory for Russian troops. Interfax also said Russian forces had ``suffered losses,'' but television reports said the military had provided no details.
REFUGEES SWELL RANKS OF HUNGER STRIKERS
In Sleptsovsk, the ranks of the hunger strikers, 22-strong last Wednesday, had been swelled by refugees who decided to join in after initially coming to offer their moral support.
Most participants were lying on camp beds in tents pitched in a field between two large refugee camps. The youngest participant was a girl of 12.
About 1,000 demonstrators shouted their support for the strikers' demands to launch talks between Putin and Chechen leader Aslan Maskhadov, elected in 1997 but now declared an outlaw by the Kremlin.
Many protesters prayed silently to show their support. Thousands of refugees still live in tent camps near the border.
Russian occupation forces returned to Chechnya in 1999 after a 1994-96 defeat by the Resistance forced them to withdraw. More than 3,000 servicemen have died, according to official accounts.
The Russians have re-established control over most Chechen territory, but have failed to flush the Resistance out of the mountains in the south.
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PHOTO CAPTION

A Chechen serviceman of special forces unit stands on guard in Chechen capital Grozny, May 26, 2001. Russian authorities say that they control most of Chechnya, but rebels continue to perform their operations against Russian military. REUTERS/Adlan Khasanov.
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