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Gang leader killed in special operation in Dagestan

NAK identified the militant as Eldar Magatov, 30, leader of the so-called Babayurt gang; until 2006, he was a member of Batayev's gang operating in Chechnya

MOSCOW, January 21. /ITAR-TASS/. A gang leader has been killed in a special operation in Dagestan, the information center of the National Antiterrorist Committee /NAK/ told Itar-Tass on Tuesday.

NAK identified the militant as Eldar Magatov, 30, leader of the so-called Babayurt gang. Until 2006, he was a member of Batayev's gang operating in Chechnya.

The Federal Security Service launched the operation after a tip that a gunman was hiding in a house in the village of Zubutli-Miatli in Dagestan's Kizilyurt district. Police sealed off the area and the NAK headquarters negotiated with Magatov the release of two women with two children who had been staying in the same house.

The militant refused to surrender and was killed in a shootout as the FSB launched the active phase of the operation.

Magatov moved to Dagestan in 2011. His gang is complicit in extortions of large funds from entrepreneurs, numerous assassination attempts on police and personnel of judicial bodies and bombings.

Police and civilians did not sustain any casualties during the Tuesday anti-terrorist operation, NAK said.