Russian forces pushed ahead with an offensive in western Chechnya on Monday, hitting the rebel-held village of Achkhoy Martan with rockets and artillery.
Cars, buses and trucks full of refugees fled Achkhoy Martan and the neighboring village of Samashky, 20 miles west of the bombed out capital of Grozny.On Sunday, the Russian military command said its troops captured a key section of road nearby.
Rebels apparently offered no resistance when the Russians took up their new position, less than a mile south of a rebel one on the Rostov-Baku highway that runs across the secessionist land.
The road that fell was the last safe link between Samashky and Achkhoy-Martan, and the new Russian outpost cuts off Samashky from other rebel-held areas.
A multiple GRAD rocket launcher unleashed a volley near a Russian military post about 1 mile west of Samashky.
"They're bombing Achkhoy Martan," said a Russian colonel with Interior Ministry forces, who declined to be identified.
A low roll of explosions sounded a few seconds later as the rockets slammed into the village. Four helicopter gunships floated above the trees, providing air support for the Russian artillery and rocket batteries.
In Samashky, Chechen fighters tried to calm a rowdy, impromptu meeting of women and elders who were upset by the bombardment. Fearing the Russians will soon turn their high explosives on them, some at the meeting urged flight.
"They (Russians) want to clear the village without a fight," said the worried commander of Chechen forces in the village, 35-year-old Akhmed Islamov. "We'll never surrender."
Tsutsitsa Sayduliyeva, a 42-year-old teacher, wasn't taking any chances.
She stood on a road with a small crowd of other would-be refugees, waiting for a truck to take her and her six daughters and nieces out of the village. Plastic bags containing a few possessions were piled next to her feet.
"We've no money, and where the girls will go to school I don't know, but we have to leave," said Sayduliyeva.
A few weary-looking fighters lay in ditches under a hot sun. Assault rifles and a few grenades were all they had to defend the village.
Many of Samashky's residents already have fled the village for other towns in Chechnya or in neighboring Ingushetia.