Russia: February 17, 2000

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Police broke up two criminal gangs in Moscow, seizing automatic weapons, rocket launchers, flame throwers and bomb making materials. Two of the 30 people arrested were Chechens who had recently arrived from Chechnya. Police in Chechnya seized nearly have a ton of explosives in the past few days. The Russians fear that Chechen terrorists plan a bombing campaign to commemorate the anniversary of the February 23, 1944 expulsion of most Chechens from Chechnya to central Asia (from which they were allowed to return thirteen years later.)