Russia becoming hot spot for terrorists

A wave of Islamic extremist terror is sweeping over "Russia's Switzerland", the multi-ethnic mountain republic of Dagestan, with almost 75 deadly attacks so far this year.

Though the rising crescendo of terrorist violence on Russia's southern flank has gone largely unnoticed in the rest of the world, the Kremlin insists that the wave of attacks that threaten to unhinge the entire north Caucasus zone is being orchestrated by the same global jihad groups that have struck in London.

A top aide to President Vladimir Putin likened the crisis to "a brush fire" that threatens to plunge Russia's southern regions into a "black hole" of chaos.

Many experts dispute the Kremlin's claim that Al Qaeda-linked extremist agitators are to blame for the spiraling unrest. They argue that poverty, corruption and organized crime are rife throughout the seven ethnic republics of the north Caucasus all but one traditionally Sunni Moslem and the still-smoldering war in next-door Chechnya has been gnawing at the roots of regional stability for over a decade.

But most agree that there has been an alarming influx of foreign jihadists into the region over the past year. Russian security forces claim to have killed or captured citizens of 52 different countries fighting in the Caucasus.

Recent incidents, including a bath-house bombing that killed 10 Russian soldiers in the Dagestani capital of Makhachkala last suggested the attackers have absorbed sophisticated tactics used by jihadists in Iraq and elsewhere. A report issued recently by Igor Dobayev, an expert with the official Academy of Sciences, suggested as many as 2,000 Islamist insurgents, many belonging to the Al Qaeda-linked Sharia Jamaat, are behind the wave of roadside explosions targeting Russian convoys, car bombings aimed at police stations, and assassinations of top officials.

Dagestan, with just over 2-million inhabitants belonging to 37 fractious ethnic groups, is the largest and potentially most volatile piece of the north Caucasus puzzle. The main pipeline for Russia's share of Caspian oil runs through coastal city of Makhachkala. It is also home to vital rail links and Caspian port facilities. The North-South transport route, which Russian and Indian leaders hope will boost trade between Europe and South Asia, would be hopelessly disrupted by any extensive trouble in Dagestan. The republic ruled since 1991 by Magomedali Magomedov, a former Communist leader, has an unemployment rate estimated at 60 per cent, and those who do work enjoy incomes that are half the Russian average.

President Vladimir Putin staged an emergency visit to Dagestan in late July kept secret until after his return to Moscow.

A secret report by the Kremlin's special envoy to the north Caucasus, Dmitry Kozak, leaked to a Moscow newspaper warned of the emergence of "Islamic Sharia enclaves" amid the high Caucasus peaks. "The unsolved social, economic and political problems are now reaching a critical level," Kozak wrote. "Further ignoring the problems and attempts to drive them deep down by force could lead to an uncontrolled chain of events whose logical result will be open social, interethnic and religious conflict in Dagestan".

Violence in Chechnya has been sharply on the rise. In the past few months alone a military helicopter crash killed 8 soldiers and an ambush on security forces in a previously "peaceful" town, claimed by "Islamic rebels", killed 14. In recent weeks 4 Russian police have died in apparent terrorist attacks in the nearby mainly-Moslem republic of Kabardino-Balkaria.

The first Chechnya war, 1994-96, was won by the nationalist, independence-seeking rebels. But experts say that since rebel president Aslan Maskhadov was killed by Russian security forces earlier this year, the Chechen insurgency is led by Islamic radicals such as Shamil Basayev, architect of a mass hostage-taking in a Moscow theatre two years ago and last September's bloody school siege in Beslan.

Basayev, along with a small army of Islamic jihadis, invaded Dagestan in 1999, but was driven back after local Dagestani militias mobilized in to support Russian forces.

Until recently, Russia has been popular among Dagestani ethnic groups and Russian is the lingua franca of communication among them.