The North Caucasus Combined Federal Forces headquarters claim that the rebels are planning to stage numerous terror attacks in Grozny. The rebels' deception plan will be to wear Russian uniforms, having bought 250 special police unit outfits. There were indicators of a growing number of rebels in Grozny and Gudermes. Extremists often use fake IDs of local policemen to move freely and transport arms. About 20 rebels were recently spotted in Grozny's Zavodskoi district.

Small attacks continue within the city. Two Russian servicemen were shot and their assault rifles taken on 1 August while buying food in Grozny's Staropromyslovsky district market. The rebels fired up four checkpoints in various Grozny districts overnight 30-31 July.

Federal Security Service (FSB) agents have been conducting preemptive search and detention operations, aimed at finding arms and ammo caches. FSB agents prevented one large-scale terrorist act in Grozny on 29 July, when they found three caches containing a total of 64 122mm artillery shells, 32 RGD-5 grenades, 150kg of plastic explosives, 16 cases with 5.45mm cartridges and a sack of religious literature in Arabic.

Several hundred rebels successfully infiltrated Grozny in late-July 1996 and launched a surprise attack on 6 August, which ultimately forced Federal forces to withdrawal from Chechnya later in the year. - Adam Geibel

In Chechnya, rebels killed two soldiers in a market place attack.