Borozdinovskaya operation The Borozdinovskaya operation was an infamous cleansing raid ( " zachiska " , ) by the ethnic Chechen unit Battalion Vostok of the Spetsnaz of GRU on the ethnic minority village of Borozdinovskaya in Chechnya near the border with the republic of Dagestan on June 4 , 2005 . Borozdinovskaya is a predominantly ethnic - Avar ( a Dagestani ethnic group ) village in the Shelkovsky District of Chechnya . Its population in early 2005 was over 1 , 000 people . The ' sweep operation ' took place after " a series of murders and armed attacks " in and around the village in May – June 2005 , including a June 3 incident in which the father of a Vostok serviceman was shot and killed . The raid prompted a mass exodus of almost the entire population of the village and contributed to a political standoff in both Chechnya and Dagestan . As a result , even some representatives of the Russian federal authorities — usually reluctant to denounce abuses by their forces — expressed outrage over the incident . Historical background . Historical relations between Avars and Chechens have been inconsistent . On one hand , conflict between Avars and Chechens is not just a recent phenomenon . Twice during the Middle Ages , the Avars tried to conquer the Chechens , meeting fierce resistance . More recently , in the 19th Century , the ethnic Avar Imam Shamil forcefully added Chechnya to his Caucasian Imamate . The Chechens tolerated this for a time because he was viewed as a lesser evil ; the Avars and the Chechens had a common foe in Russia . Shamil ' s strict interpretation of Islam , however , led to conflicts not only with the Avar elite but with the Chechens as a whole . On the other hand , there has been considerable cross - cultural fertilization between Avars and Chechens ; historically , they have been allies against Russians and , earlier , Mongols and Turkic peoples . According to the residents of Borozdinovskaya , the ethnic conflict in the area began in the mid - 1990s , during the time when many Dagestanis and ethnic Russians were being forcibly evicted from the Chechen republic , or otherwise pressured to leave by the poor economic conditions and destruction resulting from the First Chechen War . A local Avar strongman named Shapi Mikatov created an armed militia that effectively protected the village from what they called the ' Chechen gangs , ' including the men of Sulim Yamadayev , by then the most powerful separatist warlord in eastern Chechnya . According to Hussein Nutayev , the pro - Russian head of Shelkovsky District in 2004 , Mikatov ' s militia was rather " a criminal group we call the Avar jamaat . . . headed by the infamous warlord Mitabov , who is accused of numerous murders and kidnappings . " Mikatov was killed in 1998 . The next year , the Yamadayev brothers changed sides in the conflict ( as did Kadyrov ) to lead the Vostok battalion for Russian military intelligence . Since then , the residents allegedly began to be targeted by pro - Moscow Chechen forces and the inter - ethnic tensions have escalated further since Chechen authorities began resettling displaced persons from the Nozhay - Yurtovsky District in the village . The cleansing operation . According to the official investigation , on June 4 , 2005 , around 80 pro - Russian Chechen soldiers of the special battalion Vostok ( East ) , in two armored personnel carriers , several trucks , and cars , arrived in the village at 3 : 00 to perform a ' large - scale clean - up . ' According to eyewitnesses , the operation was led by Khamzat ( Hamzat ) Gairbekov , also known as ' Beard , ' who was the Vostok unit ' s intelligence chief . Between 3 : 30 and 8 : 00 , the soldiers detained 11 people " suspected of having committed crimes " : Abakar Aliyev , Magomed Isayev , Ahmed Kurbanaliyev , Magomed Kurbanaliyev , Eduard Lachkov ( an ethnic Russian ) , Ahmed Magomedov , Ahmed Magomedov , Kamil Magomedov , Said Magomedov , Shakhban Magomedov , and Martukh Umarov . All of them have not been seen since . A 77 - year old man was killed , later found either gunned down or burnt alive , and about 200 men were also rounded up and herded into the local school ' s sports hall , where many were severely beaten . Four private homesteads were burnt down and cars , money , and other valuables were stolen from the village . Aftermath . At first , the pro - Moscow Chechen police officials said 11 guerrilla ' sympathizers ' were detained and two insurgents killed in fighting . Later , the Russian military claimed the killings and abductions of civilians were committed by rebels later ( after the Vostok troops had left the settlement ) , and Sergei Surovikin , the commander of the 42nd Motor Rifle Division to which Yamadayev ’ s militia belonged , said the allegations were “ groundless and aimed at destabilizing the political situation and staining the honor and name of the honest career officer and Hero of Russia , Sulim Yamadayev . ” Most of the residents quickly packed up and crossed the border to Dagestan , where they set up a tent city near the town of Kizlyar . There , they received support from the local Avar opposition and resisted attempts by the Dagestani OMON riot police to foce them back into Chechnya . The refugees eventually agreed to return after the Chechen government of Ramzan Kadyrov promised to search for the abducted villagers and pay compensation for the damage caused by the attackers . Dmitri Kozak , the Russian presidential envoy to the Southern Federal District , met with the villagers and spoke about " an act of sabotage against the Russian state by extremists , " promising an objective investigation to punish those responsible . On October 27 , 2005 , Mukhadi Aziyev , company commander of the Vostok battalion , was convicted by Grozny Garrison Military Court of " exceeding official authority " and given a three - year suspended sentence . The fate of the abducted people was not established , and a legal demand for compensation brought by villagers against the Russian Ministry of Defence was rejected . In June 2007 , the villagers held a 300 - strong protest action in Dagestan . In September 2007 , the Caucasian Knot reported that more than 130 Borozdinovskaya refugees had begun to resettle in Kizlyar District . Colonel Sulim Yamadayev , commander of the Vostok battalion , had at first denied that his subordinates were involved in the raid . Later , he admitted his servicemen ' s guilt , but said that the operation had been conducted without his knowledge . In 2006 and again in 2008 , during the conflict between Ramzan Kadyrov and the Yamadayev clan , Kadyrov used the case as an example of the crimes of the Vostok unit in his attacks on the Yamadayev brothers .