MOSCOW, March 15: Russia said on Tuesday that a 10-million-dollar bounty enabled it to locate and kill Chechen leader Aslan Maskhadov as a popular daily cast doubt on the official version of how the moderate leader was killed.

“After a monetary reward in the sum of 10 million dollars was announced in Sept 2004 for information about the whereabouts of terrorist leaders, the FSB was approached by citizens who gave the necessary data,” a spokesman for the successor service to the Soviet-era KGB said.

“This aided in determining the exact location of international terrorist and Chechen band leader Aslan Maskhadov, as well as the carrying out of a special operation” which led to his death, he said.

“These citizens were paid the monetary reward in full,” said the spokesman.

Mr Maskhadov, a 53-year-old guerilla leader who was elected Chechnya’s president in Jan 1997, was reported killed on March 8 by Russian forces in the village of Tolstoi-Yurt, north of the capital Grozny.

The FSB hinted that those who provided the information were residents of the North Caucasus, where the tradition of blood feud is well-established and stretches generations after the original infraction.

“If necessary, they will receive help in moving to another Russian region or a Muslim country,” said the spokesman.

“The FSB is ready in the future to assure the personal security and payment of any appropriate rewards to citizens who provide reliable information about the whereabouts of terrorist leaders,” he said.

DOUBT CAST: But on Tuesday, Moscow’s popular Moskovsky Komsomolets (MK) daily cast doubt on the official version, saying that its reporter who had inspected the house said Maskhadov could not have possibly lived in the said bunker as it lacked proper ventilation.

“MK’s correspondent, who inspected every corner of the house with the owner’s wife, could not find any trace of ventilation inside the bunker,” the paper wrote. “Maskhadov would have suffocated there in 10 minutes.”—AFP