STARIYE ATAGI, Russia — After weekslong air and artillery bombardment, Russian forces stormed the last major rebel stronghold in southern Chechnya and took control of the town Tuesday, the military said.
Col. Gen. Gennady Troshev, a top Russian commander in Chechnya, said that the fall of Shatoi marked the end of the full-scale military offensive in the breakaway republic.
"Shatoi is the last populated point, a regional center, along with nine surrounding settlements. Today it is fully under the control of our forces," Troshev said. "That means that the bandit formations have been defeated."
Troshev added that it could take up to three weeks for the military to mop up the rebels who managed to escape and that Russian troops would have to perform repeated sweeps of Chechen settlements to ensure militants had not returned.
In contrast to Troshev's optimistic tone, lower-ranking Russian officers reported that fierce fighting was still under way in the mountainous region surrounding the town, 30 miles south of the Chechen capital, Grozny.
They said that far from being destroyed, most of the 2,000 rebels who had been holed up in Shatoi had escaped into nearby villages and could be expected to regroup for a counteroffensive.
Capt. Mikhail Komarov said it was too early to celebrate victory, predicting that the rebels from several settlements would probably unite, and "we will get a second Shatoi."
"I'm just stunned by the helplessness of our military commanders," he said. "For how much longer will we be running around the mountains like goats?"
Meanwhile, Chechen rebels battled federal forces trying to penetrate the Argun Gorge, which cuts through the southern mountains to the Georgian border. The military claimed it had surrounded the villages of Duba-Yurt, Dachu-Borzoi and Chishki, all at the gorge's northern end.
The most intense fighting was further south, around the villages of Ulus-Kert, Zony, and Kordon. There was incessant overnight shelling of the villages, and not a single house had been left undamaged.
Refugees reported that 25 civilians had been killed on Thursday near Zony when they tried to escape through a "safe corridor" provided by the military. Isa Magomadov, a refugee from Duba-Yurt, said the refugees had buried 12 of the victims but had to flee before burying the remaining 13.
The report could not be independently confirmed. But similar reports of civilian casualties have provoked international criticism of Russia's 5-month-old military offensive.
On Monday, Alvaro Gil-Robles, the human rights commissioner of the Council of Europe, made a one-day visit to shattered Grozny. A relentless Russian offense drove rebels to flee Grozny en masse in early February.
Gil-Robles said he would continue to press for investigation of alleged human rights abuses in Chechnya.
He also said Russian authorities had agreed that a human rights group could open an observer mission in Gudermes, Chechnya's second-largest city, within two weeks, but did not have further details.
In Geneva, the U.N. refugee agency today voiced concerns over reports that men in the Argun Gorge are being detained.
Refugees arriving in neighboring Ingushetia have told aid officials that "all males aged 15 and older are detained by the local police for establishment of their identity," said Ron Redmond, spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees. In some cases, refugees said, the men were not released.
Russia sent ground forces into Chechnya in late September to fight separatist rebels whom it blamed for apartment bombings in Russia. The bombings came after Chechnya-based Muslim fighters invaded the neighboring republic of Dagestan in August and were driven out by Russian forces.