The Tsunami : More Than A Natural DIsaster?

The Tsunami: More Than A Natural Disaster?










Nuclear Sub Crushed
Updated: 11:41, Friday January 28, 2005

The first pictures of an American nuclear submarine that crashed into an undersea mountain have been released.

The USS San Francisco was travelling at around 30 miles an hour when it ran aground 350 miles off the coast of Guam last month.

Pictures released by the US Navy show the front of the submarine completely cut off.

One sailor was killed and 23 others seriously injured.

A team of navy experts is preparing to assess the damage to determine whether the warship can be repaired and returned to sea.

Satellite images of the area where the submarine crashed show a wedge-shaped mountain that stretches across more than a mile of desolate expanse in the South Pacific.

Military officials told the New York Times that the mountain, which rises within 100 feet of the surface, was not on the navigation charts.

The satellite pictures suggest that the mountain is part of a larger range of undersea volcanoes and reefs.

Experts say that had the sub's active sonar system been switched on it may have been able to detect the mountain.

But US submarines usually have it switched off because when it detects anything, it makes a loud pinging noise and can give away the sub's location to potential enemies.



Nuclear Sub Crashed - Sky News Article - try searching for it now - bet you wont be able to find it unless you press this link




The Newly Rebuilt USS San Francisco - You'd never have guessed it lost its front would you?






2005 Pakistani Earthquake

The Kashmir earthquake (زلزلہ کشمیر) (also known as the South Asia earthquake or Pakistan earthquake) of 2005, was a major earthquake whose epicenter was the Pakistan-administered Kashmir. The earthquake occurred at 08:50:38 Pakistan Standard Time (03:50:38 UTC) on October 8, 2005. It registered a minimum magnitude of 7.6 on the moment magnitude scale making it a major earthquake similar in intensity to the 1935 Quetta earthquake, the 2001 Gujarat Earthquake, and the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. As of 8 November, the Pakistani government's official death toll was 73,276, while officials say nearly 1,400 people died in Indian-administered Kashmir and fourteen people in Afghanistan.









Photo of "Glowing Mountain" Following Underground Nuclear Tests in Pakistan, 28 May 1998.

The above photograph is a clip German television. It shows a mountain on the India-Pakistan border which is anomalously glowing following a series of nearby underground nuclear bomb tests. No additional information is available at this time. Special thanks to Dr. Franz Lutz of IRT in Germany for providing the photo. More information on the underground nuclear tests is given below, taken from an earlier OBRL-News posting.

NOTE: See the "Postscript September 2002" below, for a graph of meteorological data on India's monsoon rains since 1988, providing supporting evidence for the discussion given here.


Global Atmospheric-Geophysical Effects from the
India-Pakistan Nuclear Bomb Tests
May 11-13 and May 29, 1998

Two Months After -- A Preliminary Report
by James DeMeo, Ph.D.

Over 50 years ago, Wilhelm Reich observed unusual long-distance effects from above-ground nuclear tests. Dr. Reich's observations were based upon his discovery of a unique life-energetic force in the atmosphere (the orgone energy) which underlay nuclear, meteorological and biological phenomenon , much in the manner of the older physical concept of "aether" and "vital force" combined, but also with meteorolgical properties. With a nuclear bomb test, the orgone energy became highly agitated and irritated, much in the manner of irritated protoplasm, but on a much larger planetary scale -- literally, his ideas suggest the concept of the "living earth" is more than metaphor, and that the Earth's life-energy field could be highly disturbed. Reich called this disturbed/iritated phenomenon the "Oranur Effect".

In more recent years, observations on Oranur were corroborated by followers of Reich's approach (Jerome Eden, Richard Blasband, James DeMeo, Stephen Nagy) as also occurring after underground nuclear tests, and following nuclear power plant accidents. The nuclear tests or accidents create a tremendous Oranur disturbance in the energetic substrate which permeates the earth, atmosphere, and living creature; observed effects included heat waves, increased high pressure, and social/human reactions often expressed as riots or social disturbances which burst forth on the social scene in a disproportionate manner -- the human emotive-thinking process appears affected, just as is the atmospheric pressure and clouds. A patterned "downwind" hemispherical response was discovered, wherein nuclear bomb tests or accidents in Asia would be followed by heat waves in the USA within about two to three weeks. In some cases, the transition of anomalous stagnant air masses moving across the Pacific Ocean could be followed on satellite images (as an expanding cloud-free area) after the Asian bomb tests. Nuclear tests in Nevada, USA produced more immediate local results.

Other scientists who had no knowledge of Reich's earlier observations, such as Gary Whiteford, Yoshio Kato and Mitzuru Katagiri, independently observed similar anomalous long-distance effects following underground nuclear tests and/or nuclear power plant accidents. These effects included anomalous changes in global earthquake patterns, changes in upper atmospheric temperature, and anomalous perturbances in the Earth's polar motion.

All of the above individuals, with one exception, hold advanced degrees in physical or social/health sciences, and many were employed at universities. They have presented their observations in papers to various scholarly scientific societies, published in a few non-mainstream science journals, but they have been mostly ignored by the power-brokers of modern Big Science. Contemporary physics denies the possibility of such long-distance effects, as it continues to rely upon disproven and outdated assumptions of "empty space", with dismissive ignoring of data on the existence of life-energetic phenomena (such as the human energy field) or related concepts in geophysics (such as the Earth's energy field, which is similar in some respects to geomagnetism).

Most environmental groups, having fought for years to gain a foothold in the halls of academic and political power, likewise refuse to consider the reality of these long-distance anomalous effects from nuclear bomb tests and power plant accidents. Nevertheless, the effects appear real, and sufficiently documented to satisfy all but the most intractable critic that there is something going on that deserves a public airing of the issue, and further investigation. (Full citations on all the above mentioned individuals and effects, with pertinent article reprints, can be found in the publication "Unusual, Long-Distance Atmospheric and Geophysical Effects from Underground Nuclear Bomb Tests and Nuclear Power Plant Accidents", available for $7 postpaid from Natural Energy Works, PO Box 1148, Ashland, Oregon 97520 USA).

Here is a chronology of recent events following the unprecedented testing of ten nuclear bombs by India and Pakistan all within a few days time, and in the same geographical region, with a spreading eastward of the disturbance over ensuing weeks.


11-13 May: India tests five (5) nuclear bomb tests underground at its test site near the Pakistan border. The explosions measured up to 5.6 Magnitude on the world's seismological network. Yields were said to be around 10 KT.

22 May: Killer heat wave hits India and Pakistan, with temperatures up to 120 F, and 34 dead as of this date. "the lingering early-season heat wave is unusually severe". The heat wave occurred so quickly after the nuclear tests, and ordinary citizens in the region were asking questions about the relationship between the two events so frequently, such that the Indian Meteorological officials made a public statement denying any relationship.

27 May: China reports massive flooding. 128 dead (The floods in China appear related to a high-pressure blockage over India of Easterly winds, which were forced northward to dump their moisture along the eastern edge of the Tibetan Plateau.)

28 May: Pakistan tests five (5) nuclear bomb tests underground at its test site near the Indian border. The explosions measured up to 4.6 Magnitude.

29 May: "366 Dead in India Heat Wave" Temperatures up to 122 F. "Most devastating heat wave in years"

30 May: Killer earthquake in Afghanistan. 2,500 dead, 6.9 Magnitude.

1 June: Another 100 dead in India Heat Wave.

5 June: Heat wave in India/Pakistan death toll up to 1,359 persons.

5 June: Swarms of tornadoes across the USA. Spencer, South Dakota is wiped off the map. Also in Michigan, Tennessee, Pensylvania and New York -- regions where tornadoes are highly unusual.

12 June: Heat wave in India/Pakistan death toll now at 2,500 persons.

12-19 June: China reports flooding, 100,000 persons evacuated, 40 deaths.

19 June: "Weather block" reported across USA, in place for several weeks (back dates approximately to the time of the Pakistani tests). Florida going bone-dry. Considered to be the by-product of "heat from the expired El Nino" (If El Nino has "expired" then from where does the heat come? This statement is highly over-reaching, searching for an answer, but falls short due to lack of adequate mechanism.)

3 July: Wildfires across Florida. Tens of thousands evacuated. Heat wave and smokes from Mexico to Texas to Florida.

3 July: Severe monsoon storms wreak havoc in Sri Lanka. 60 mph winds. Nature is pushing agains the blockage.

9 July: Subtle shift in tropical weather globally: Fires weaken in Florida, rains developing in drought areas of Africa, India, etc.

18 July: Heat wave now moving north, spreading into Midwest and West USA.

In addition to the above, civil riots also errupted in parts of India and Indonesia following the nuclear tests, and a wholely unanticipated border war errupted between Eritrea and Ethiopia (whose leaders are former allies).

Based upon the above, it would appear the global effects from the ten India/Pakistan atomic bomb tests of May 1998 included:
* Over 5,500 persons dead from earthquake, heat wave, and flood.
* Approximately 200,000 persons forced to evacuate homes in China and Florida, to escape the effects of flooding and wildfire, respectively.
* Financial costs are unknown, but surely must be over 1 Billion US dollars.
* The final chapter has not yet been written: heat wave conditions which started after the nuclear tests may persist in the USA and elsewhere.

It is difficult to say whether the spreading north of the oranur heat wave conditions into the Midwestern USA will be only temporary. It is possible the oranur effect which firstly irrupted in India/Pakistan attendant to the nuclear tests, which later spread regionally and eventually east across the Indian and Pacific Oceans into North America (primarily into Mexico and the southern USA states) is now moving again. If so, the East Coast should be affected soon, followed by Europe as it continues eastward.

Citations to the above chronological events will be provided in a published version of this article, but are otherwise available from Earthweek, and via wire service reports in most major newspapers over the last several months.

See: "Unusual, Long-Distance Atmospheric and Geophysical Effects from Underground Nuclear Bomb Tests and Nuclear Power Plant Accidents", available for $7 postpaid from Natural Energy Works, PO Box 1148, Ashland, Oregon 97520 USA.

OBRL-News is scaled-down at least until mid-September when the Lab's summer field research program in Africa is completed.

**********








Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan (Urdu: عبدالقدیر خان )(b. 1935) is a Pakistani Scientist and Metallurgical Engineer widely regarded as the founder of Pakistan's nuclear programme and also credited as the father of the Pakistani nuclear black market. (His middle name is also, occasionally, rendered as Quadeer, Qadir or Gadeer and his given names are often abbreviated to A.Q.). In January 2004, he confessed to having been involved in a clandestine international network of nuclear weapons technology proliferation from Pakistan to Libya, Iran and North Korea. On February 5, 2004, the President of Pakistan, General Pervez Musharraf, announced that he had pardoned Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan. Despite this political scandal he is still regarded as the Hero of the Nation by virtually all Pakistanis.

In a August 23, 2005 interview with Kyodo News General Pervez Musharraf confirmed that Dr. A.Q. Khan had supplied gas centrifuges and gas centrifuge parts to North Korea and, possibly, an amount of uranium hexafluoride gas.[1]

Nearly .... but not quite !!

NEARLY....



...BUT NOT QUITE!!!!

FLOOD MAPS OF THE WORLD

Here's the link to the map:

Flood Maps of The World if the sea rises from 7m to 14 metres

Photos 0f London and The UK Dec. 2006

The O2 Building formerly known as The Millenium Dome






South of the River from The Isle of Dogs





North of The River from The Isle of Dogs






Canary Wharf Up Close






Canary Wharf






The Isle of Dogs





A View from the Isle of Dogs







"The Gherkin"






The Tower of London






Tower Bridge






The City of London







The Monument - built to commemorate The Great Fire of London







The London Authority Building - Where Mayor Ken Livingstone makes big decisions like holding a 50th Birthday Party for Fidel Castro







HMS Belfast






What Used to be known as The Post Office Tower (now just known as a listening post)







St Pauls Cathedral In The Distance








The Houses of Parliament - One of those Great Centres of Democracy







Big Ben






The Millenium Wheel During The Day






Christmas Lights at The Natural History Museum Ice Rink





The Millenium Wheel at Night






Picadilly Circus At Night







Old Style No 9 Bus






The Ritz







The Victoria and Albert Museum






Charing Cross Station At Night






The Lanesborough Hotel






Royal College of Music






The Natural History Museum







Battersea Power Station - Recently sold for a 1000 % profit






A View of A Mews






The Albert Memorial





The Albert Hall




Harrods






The Christmas Tree - Trafalgar Square







The Sea Near Worthing







Kite Flying Near Worthing







Horses Grazing in A Field Near Gatwick

UK Marines not getting Promised Pay Rise

Marines on patrol in Helmand


Marines 'lose' payment in blunder

The morale of marines could be affected, the opposition said


Royal Marines serving in Afghanistan have been left disappointed after being told they will not receive an expected increase in their allowance.

Because of a blunder by Royal Navy administrators the marines had been led to believe they would receive a bonus of up to £3,000.

The Ministry of Defence has since realised the error and said the marines will not be paid the money.

An MoD spokesman said the internal mistake had been "regrettable".

Under new pay regulations Royal Marines had been led to believe they would receive up to £17 extra a day over a six-month period overseas, it was reported.

Morale 'affected'

The error was included in an internal Royal Navy instruction outlining a new pay scheme.

Mark Harper, the shadow defence minister, told the Daily Telegraph: "This will have a huge effect on morale for troops engaged in some of the most dangerous fighting for years, especially in the run-up to Christmas."

An MoD spokeswoman said: "The Royal Navy and Royal Marine personnel will be paid under joint personnel agency arrangements from this month.

"Regrettably the internal Royal Navy instruction was wrong and some personnel are disappointed that they will not receive this substantial uplift.

"However, it is important to note that they are not taking a cut."

Taken from: BBC News Thursday 30 th November 2006

Litvinenko and the Chechens

The mystery of Litvinenko's death
By Tom Geoghegan
BBC News

The death bed statement by Alexander Litvinenko blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for the poison he believes took his life. But will we ever know with certainty who was responsible?

As the speculation about what poisoned Mr Litvinenko comes to an end with the announcement that radioactive substance polonium-210 was probably to blame, the question of who was responsible persists.

The former spy's two meetings in central London on 1 November, in Piccadilly and Mayfair, may hold the key to the identity of his killer.

Alexander Litvinenko
The former KGB agent made enemies
Friends of the 43-year-old have blamed the Russian security service (FSB), as Mr Litvinenko accused it of many abuses, including the bombing of several apartment blocks in Russia in 1999, which killed 300 people.

Others had linked his sickness directly to another focus of his criticisms, former KGB agent Putin.

Any involvement has been dismissed by the Kremlin as "nonsense", a sentiment echoed by Russia's foreign intelligence service.

The matter is now in the hands of Scotland Yard, which is investigating the case as an "unexplained death".

Security analyst Glenmore Trenear-Harvey, who met Mr Litvinenko several times, said the media focus on the Kremlin was "lazy" and bore the hallmarks of a John Le Carre novel.

"We have to put this in a historical context," he said.

"Litvinenko's last job within the FSB was heading up the anti-corruption unit and he discovered a lot of corruption there and made a lot of enemies within the KGB."

When Yeltsin broke the KGB into different agencies such as the FSB and the SVR, the majority of its members stayed on but some went into the Duma and a third group went into legitimate business, he said.

But a "murky bunch" went into what was known as the Russian mafia.




Chechens freed in Forbes killing
Paul Klebnikov

Klebnikov was shot in a Moscow street in July 2004
A Moscow court has acquitted two Chechen men of murdering American journalist Paul Klebnikov.

Klebnikov was editor of the Russian edition of Forbes business magazine, which had tackled the issue of corruption in Russia's powerful elite.

He was shot dead in what appeared to be a contract killing as he left his Moscow office in July 2004.

Prosecutors had alleged that the two men carried out the killing on behalf of a former Chechen rebel leader.

They said fugitive Khozh-Akhmed Nukhayev, who had featured in a book Klebnikov had written, had paid a criminal gang to kill him.

But a jury at the Moscow City Court voted to acquit Kazbek Dukuzov, 32, and Musa Vakhayev, 42, who were both charged with the actual shooting death of Klebnikov.

A third suspect, Fail Sadretdinov, faced charges of attempted murder in a separate case and organising the gang alleged to have killed the journalist. He was also acquitted.

The men had denied the charges against them.

'Not satisfied'

The trial began in January and took place behind closed doors.

Relatives of the men cheered and applauded at the acquittal. Outside the court, Mr Dukuzov said he was "grateful to the entire Russian people".

Klebnikov's family said in a statement that it respected the outcome of the trial, but urged the Russian government to continue its investigation "with renewed vigour".

"We will not be satisfied until justice is served and the individual or individuals who ordered Paul's killing are found out and brought to trial," Klebnikov's brother Michael said.

Prosecutor Dmitry Shokin said the state might appeal against the verdict.

Klebnikov's death caused an international outcry and led to speculation that it might have been linked to investigations he was involved in regarding the Russian business world.

A New Yorker of Russian origin, Klebnikov had worked for Forbes for more than 13 years. The Russian edition of the magazine had been launched earlier in 2004.

It had published a list of the country's wealthiest people and claimed that Moscow had more billionaires than any other city in the world.




The killing of journalist Anna Politkovskaya bore the hallmarks of a contract killing, according to anonymous police sources interviewed by Russian media.

Russian actor Alexei Panin in the hitmen film Zhmurki (image: CTB film company website)
Russian films like Zhmurki have captured the world of the hitmen
The hitman or killer (pronounced "keeler" in Russian) is a phenomenon of the country's shock transition from communism to a market economy.

You would use the Russian verb zakazat' to order a pizza or a plane ticket but when you "order someone", in the popular parlance, it means you want them killed by one of these hired hitmen.

If Russian media accounts are to be believed, his wages can range from a modest $100 to sums running into the hundreds of thousands of dollars, depending on the target.

When Ms Politkovskaya was shot at her home, there did not appear to be any attempt at robbery and the presumed weapon, a Makarov pistol, was left at the scene together with its used cartridges.

When Russian television broadcast CCTV footage from the apartment block entrance, it showed the chief suspect to be a thin man in a baseball cap, his face a blur.

If this was a contract killing, identifying the perpetrator - and those behind him - will be difficult.

Open season

One of my memories of Moscow in the winter of 1996 was passing a set of bullet-holes in a subway on my way to work.


SUSPECTED CONTRACT KILLINGS
The late Anna Politkovskaya
October 2006 - campaigning Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya shot dead in Moscow
Sept 2006 - first deputy chairman of Russia's central bank Andrei Kozlov shot dead in Moscow
Oct 2005 - former bank head Alexander Slesarev gunned down near Moscow
July 2004 - US editor of Forbes' Russian edition Paul Klebnikov shot dead in Moscow
Oct 2002 - Magadan governor Valentin Tsvetkov killed in Moscow
Nov 1998 - liberal MP Galina Starovoitova killed in St Petersburg
March 1995 - leading journalist Vladislav Listyev shot dead in Moscow

Nobody seemed in a rush to fix the chipped tiles, just a short distance from a luxury hotel.

For those who knew, the holes marked the spot where US businessman Paul Tatum was machine-gunned to death.

The chief lesson from his unsolved death appeared to be that prominent foreigners could be targets too.

The death of much-loved TV anchorman Vlad Listyev the previous year had already established that fame was no protection from the hired guns.

A wave of contract killings washed through Russia in the 1990s, sweeping away new bankers and businessmen.

With the security apparatus in freefall and war raging in the Caucasus, the country seemed awash with guns. Another memory for me is descending an empty escalator in a metro station beside Red Square one night and seeing one "wide boy" slapping another on his knees as he held a pistol to his head.

By the early years of this century - with Vladimir Putin in power - the wave seemed to be receding.

And then came the murder of another American, Forbes journalist Paul Klebnikov, in 2004 and, this September, deputy head of the Central Bank Andrei Kozlov.

Both were shot dead - Klebnikov outside his office, Kozlov in his car.

Nobody has ever been convicted of their murders despite hopes for a while that the Klebnikov case would be solved.

But while "unsolved" is a word you associate almost automatically with contract killings in Russia, occasionally a killer is caught.

1990s survivors

Alexander Solonik, aka Alexander The Great, aka superkiller, confessed to assassinating a string of Moscow underworld figures in the early 1990s without, it is said, revealing his paymasters.

CCTV image of the suspected killer broadcast by Russia's NTV channel
The killer of Politkovskaya appears to have been caught on CCTV

He also cut a bloody swathe through the capital's police force before his arrest in 1994.

Solonik's main "qualifications" for the work of a hired killer appear to have been a period of military service, an early spell in prison, good physical fitness and a reputed ability to shoot with both hands.

Escaping from Moscow's famous Matrosskaya Tishina (Sailor's Rest) prison in 1995, he fled abroad only to be murdered along with his girl-friend in Greece a couple of years later.

Russian film director Alexei Balabanov's 2005 black comedy Zhmurki (Blind Man's Buff), about hitmen, begins in a morgue where some fresh corpses are soon added to the display.

Sub-titled "For those who survived the '90s", it struck a popular chord, capturing a grotesque world of casual killers, rapacious New Russians and cowed police.

There may be fewer raspberry-red blazers and long leather jackets in Moscow today, and the city now teems with hard-faced police, but it seems the phenomenon of the killer survived the '90s too.



Chechnya - Land of the warlords


The country's rogue prime minister Ramzan Kadyrov, 29, who wields a private army and loves boxing, is facing armed opposition from rival pro-Russian factions. Nick Paton Walsh reports

Nick Paton Walsh, Grozny
Tuesday June 13, 2006
Guardian Unlimited

Akhmad Kadyrov
Akmad Kadyrov, the Chechen president assassinated in 2004. His son Ramzan, the prime minister, wants the post. Photograph: AP

In the end, there are perhaps just a few lengths of piping between Chechnya and a new civil war. It was late one night last month, and one of the tearaway relatives of Chechen prime minister Ramzan Kadyrov was driving out of the war-torn republic a truckload of oil pipework for sale on the black market in southern Russia.

Yet his family connections to Chechnya's de facto boss, the 29-year-old thuggish prime minister who rules the republic with a private army, were no free pass out of the republic. In order to cross the border he had to pass the stronghold of a rival warlord, Movladi Baysarov, a colonel in the Russian security services, the FSB. Baysarov's men stopped the truck and began asking questions, prompting their light-fingered new owner to ring his powerful relative, Ramzan.

Article continues
"One of Kadyrov's deputies got together a thousand men and encircled Baysarov's stronghold to disarm him," said Rashid, a soldier in an armed unit loyal to Kadyrov who did not want to be identified. The incident soon gained a life of its own, exposing the deep rifts that Kadyrov's meteoric rise has created between the rival factions of pro-Russian Chechen warlords who today control the republic for Moscow.

"Baysarov ordered his men not to be the first to shoot, as he didn't want Chechens killing Chechens", said Rashid. "They came out and told Kadyrov's men that they were only 50 strong but ready to die like honest Muslims if it came to it."

The standoff could have ended in bloodshed and perhaps further conflict were it not for the president of Chechnya, Kadyrov's boss Alu Alkhanov, and another Chechen warlord, Said Magomed Kakiev, swinging in behind Baysarov and his men. They telephoned Kadyrov, forcing him to withdraw his troops.

Growing tension between the rival Chechen warlords who now hold sway in the republic is being fuelled by the presidential ambitions of prime minister Kadyrov. He turns 30 in October, the minimum age under the constitution for the top post of president, held by his father, Akhmad, until his assassination in May 2004.

"Ramzan wants to become a god in the republic," said Rashid. "Any group that does not obey him completely is deemed illegal."

Moscow has since 2003 slowly handed control of the republic to loyal Chechens in a bid to reduce troop numbers and wash its hands of a conflict it reignited through its second invasion of Chechnya over six years ago. Yet the growing power struggle between pro-Moscow Chechens threatens this withdrawal and erratic improvements to daily life, such as some better roads, running water and a drop in the number of abductions.

Kadyrov's presidential ambitions are obstructed by more experienced pro-Moscow Chechen commanders who head battalions of war-hardened mercenaries, some of whom gave rare interviews to the Guardian. They object to the inexperience and crude style of the young premier, a boxing fan who backs polygamy, has a pet lion and is friends with Mike Tyson.

Zair, the assumed name of a senior officer in one of Kadyrov's units, said: "They'll all go against Ramzan if he picks a fight. Any provocation and it could all go off."

Another incident in the last month helped expose these simmering rivalries. On April 25 Kadyrov attended a meeting with Alkhanov and a senior Kremlin official at the presidential administration. Alkhanov's security team would not allow Kadyrov's bodyguards into the building, so Kadyrov's security chief hit his counterpart in the face.

"There was a lot of shooting, mostly in the air," said Zair. "Alkhanov rang for the help of Said Magomed Kakiev", the powerful head of the "West" battalion of 900 Chechen fighters under the control of Russian military intelligence, the GRU. Rashid added: "When Kakiev got there, Kadyrov's lot left, saying they'd be back in 20 minutes. They never returned". At least three men were wounded in the exchange of fire, some reports suggesting two died.

Zair said Kadyrov then gathered senior MPs and put pressure on Alkhanov to claim he was seriously ill and resign in October. Anxious to prevent open conflict, Russian president Vladimir Putin summoned Alkhanov and Kadyrov to Moscow for a carpeting. Alkhanov returned to Grozny and told the Interfax news agency he was the elected president and would remain so. Yet Kadyrov retains his ambitions, many accusing him of being behind a poll recently circulated among Grozny residents asking whether he or Alkhanov was behind recent improvements in the capital.

Zair said Alkhanov has gained the support of not only Kakiev but Sulim Yamadayev, the head of the "East" battalion, 800 hardened special forces Chechens also under the control of the GRU. He said Yamadayev's men got into a shoot-out with Kadyrov's people 15 days ago in which up to three people were injured.

Alkhanov is also backed by Baysarov, a former confidant of Kadyrov's father. Baysarov has been declared an "outlaw" by Ramzan yet retains a unit of 50 men just outside Grozny, reportedly protected by the FSB. Baysarov is said to be broadly respected by Chechen commanders, as was highlighted by the recent conflict with Kadyrov's men.

Zair and Rashid, both mercenaries under Kadyrov's control, said they disliked the cult of personality Kadyrov was creating by putting up posters of himself around Grozny. They both said they would refuse to fight and stay at home if Kadyrov took on Baysarov. "Ramzan hardly speaks Russian at all," said Zair, in disdain at his poor education.

Amid the infighting, the threat posed by Islamic separatist militants led by Beslan mastermind Shamil Basayev has become a distraction. "We're too busy fighting amongst ourselves to care about the militants," said Zair. Yet the constant realignment of mercenaries under Kadyrov's control has raised fears militant numbers may grow.

Kadyrov was recently forced to disband the Anti-Terrorist Centre (ATS), a group of former militants on his payroll, after they were accused of repeated abuses and separatist sympathies. Zair and Rashid said one ATS commander, known as Mullah, had been caught feeding information to the separatists. "Ramzan ordered that his entire family be wiped out," they said.

Rashid said that only a fifth of the 10,000 hired guns in the ATS had been given new jobs in Kadyrov's forces, leaving 8,000 mercenaries without work. "Maybe some will stay at home, maybe some will join the militants," he said.

* Who's who in the new Chechnya: Ramzan Kadyrov: PM with presidential ambitions. Controls "North" and "South" interior ministry units and thousands of other mercenaries.
* Alu Alkhanov: president under threat from Kadyrov. Respected by senior pro-Moscow Chechens.
* Movladi Baysarov: has unit of 50 men, widely respected yet disliked by Kadyrov. Protected by FSB.
* Sulim Yamadayev: heads 1000 strong East battalion, controlled by the chief intelligence directorate (GRU) of the Russian military. Dislikes Kadyrov.
* Said Magomed Kakiev: commander of 900-strong "West" battalion, also under GRU control. Dislikes Kadyrov.
* Adam Delimkhanov: top deputy to Kadyrov, and his successor if Kadyrov is killed. Controls "North" unit and the "Neftepolk" elite troops that protect the oil system.