Presnensky district investigative department in the chief directorate of the Moscow branch of the Investigative Committee has terminated criminal investigation into the kidnapping of Movladi (Ruslan) Atlangeriyev, a thief-in-law (high ranking criminal boss who is considered by other mobsters as having authority to settle conflicts between criminal groups) and FSB double agent. The investigation stopped due to «inability to identify an individual liable to the criminal prosecution». However it is no secret for the domestic security agents that Atlangeriyev was snatched in Moscow by Chechens,  who moved him in the Chechen Republic just to kill this remarkable organised crime kingpin. He began his career in the 70s with burglaries at rich students' flats, in the 80s he was involved in the violences of the gangsters' wars in Moscow, in the 90s he helped Boris Berezovsky build up his business empire and in the 2000s he cooperated with the FSB while the agency was carring out its operations to detain and annihilate the key figures in the Chechen militant groups.

Moscow's bloodiest gang

Movladi Atlangeriyev (friends and relatives called him Ruslan) was born on June 16, 1954 in Karaganda in Kazakh SSR in the family of IDPs from Chechnya. In 1951 another child was born in a Chechen family in Karaganda - future president of the Chechen Republic Akhmad-Khadzhi Kadyrov. Kadyrov and Atlangeriyev were childhood friends. After their son finished school the well-to-do Atlangeriyevs sent him to Plekhanov Moscow Institute of National Economy. At the same time Ruslan's peer Khozh-Akhmed Nukhaev (Khozh), born to an IDP in Kirgiz SSR, went to another high school in the capital - Moscow State University. Very soon young people became friends. Both were Chechens, both were pleasure seekers: they enjoyed tailored suits, restaurants and foreign cars. But this way of live was very hard to follow in the Soviet Union in the 70s.     

Chechens left university just to learn criminal trade. Their first targets were foreign students from Africa and Arab world who profited from illegal currency exchange and merchandise smuggling. Their flats got robbed while criminals easily avoided punishment because the victims were reluctant to report the police (profiteers were severely prosecuted in the USSR).   

Former FSB agent Aleksandr Litvinenko (poisoned in London in 2006) told the author that since as early as the 70s Atlangeriyev and Nukhayev had cooperated with the KGB where they received tip-offs about the foreigners.  However at the beginning of the 80s Chechens robbed a «wrong» student whose parents held important positions in their country. Eventually Ruslan and Khozh were detained and found guilty of the break-ins and fraud. Doing their terms, they permanently violated prison discipline and got into scuffles which made them respected in the underworld. Atlangeriyev and Nukhaev were released in 1988 in the «heydays» of perestroika when first criminal groups cropped up in Moscow.  

 

Maksim Lazovsky

By that time the Chechen groups in Moscow were still disorganized. Their leaders were: Nikolay Suleymanov (Khoza), Lecha Altamirov (Lecha Lusy - Lecha the Boldheaded), Mussa Talarov (Starik - the Old Man), Lecha Islamov (Boroda - the Bearded), Mustafa Shidaev and Balaudi Tekilov (Malysh - the Baby). The bands controlled mainly car-dealing and hotels and severely competed with mighty Slavonic groups: Orehkovskaya, Baumanskaya, Lyuberetskya, Balashikhinskaya and Orekhovskaya groups. Sometimes the gangsters substituted for official authorities in the cities. Their growth could not go unnoticed by the KGB. According to Litvinenko, the security agents decided to form alternative power in the underworld. Atlangeriyev and Nukhaev were ready to help.     

Within the shortest time disorganised group were united into Lozanskaya group. It was named after a Moscow restaurant, the group used as the headquarters -  «Lozanya» (Lasagna). The group became «respected» when Atlangeriev and Nukhaev invited two influencial underworld bosses - thieves-in-law Gennady Lobzhanidze (Gena Shram - Gena the Scarred) and Tengiz Marianoshvili - to be the group's overseers. The KGB also infiltrated its agent Grozny-born Maksim Lazovsky (Khromoy - the Lame) in the group. Within a single year Lozanskaya gang grew into the most influential organised crime group. 

They controlled all Berezka shops (chain of outlets which sold expensive food and merchandise for currency or special bonds), car market, all commercial enterprises in five districts of the capital, the majority of Moscow hotels and petrol stations. With rivals from the Slavonic gangs they dealt shortly and violently. For instance, when in 1988 the conflict emerged between the leaders Baumanskaya and Lozanskaya group, 30 Chechen bandits broke into Labirinth Restaurant in Kalininsky Prospect and stabbed 15-20 Slavonic brigade commanders. Ruslan and Khoza themselves took part in the stabbing. After that, Baumanskaya group gangsters did not mess with Lozanskaya group. Another bloody showdown took place in front of Atrium café in Leninsky Prospect, where Lyuberetskaya group fought with knieves against Chechen gangters.   

e-fits of Movladi Atlangeriev

The assets in the South-Westen district of Moscow became the subject of conflict between Solntsevskaya and Lozanskaya groups. The violence grew rampant. But then the thieves-in-law stepped in and the conflict was settled by distributing objects between competing gangs. However this case was exceptional, because the Lozanskaya gang did obey only certain thieves-in-law. For example, once a group of gangsters led by thief-in-law Zakhary Kalashov who had power to settle conflicts tried to negotiate with Chechen bandits and Khoza. It resulted into stabbing, when the Chechens rushed to the attack.  

Within a little more than a year Lozanskaya group annihilated more than a score of the leaders of different organised crime groups. They gained reputation of uncompromising tough guys, which no one dared to challenge. By 1990 all the Chechens became billionares.

Berezovsky's racketeers

All these events coincided with nationalistic and separatist movement in Chechnya. The gang leaders who were very influencial in the republic actively spurred the processes. Taking over the whole independent country was lucrative perspective.

Late in 1990 the national congress of the Chechen people elected general Dudaev as the republic's leader. The Kremlin wrongfully expected him being loyal. In spring 1991 supported by all forces in the republic and backed by Lozanskaya group funds he demanded to dismiss the Supreme Council (parliament) of Chechen-Ingush Autonomus SSR. After the August Putsch he seized power in the republic and proclaimed independence of Chechnya which meant the republic was no longer part of Russia. This met enthusiastic support of the Lozanskaya group.  

However the majority of its member had already been put behind bars. In 1990 special agencies realised that they had lost control over the group. The operation was carried out to catch all the leaders. KGB agent Maksim Lazovsky, Mastafa Shidayev, Balaudi Tekilov, Nikolay Suleymanov, Lechi Islamov, Gennady Lobzhanidze, Ruslan Atlangeriyev and Khozh-Akhmed Nukhaev were arrested on chargers of extortions and drug dealing. The charges of extortion were brought in against the latest three - they extorted money from a Dashyants, a sausage factory director. They were found guilty by Moscow's Zamoskvoretsky court and sentenced to 8 years of the prison camp.

 

Nikolay Suleymanov (alias: Khoza)

However they did not do the whole terms and their imprisonment did not last long. The most striking example of how bandits set themselves free is Khozh-Akhmed Nukhaev. He was sent to the camp in Khabarovsky Region. In November 1991 the squad of militia from Grozny arrived to the camp. They had documents, according to which, Chechen militia had initiated criminal proceedings against him, that is why he had to be moved to Chechnya. In independent republic he was set free. The Supreme Court of the republic canceled the guilty verdict and very soon Khozh became close ally of Dudayev.

Sooner or later the leaders of Lozanskaya group were released, although they had different fate.

Nikolay Suleymanov spent 2 years in prison, then he was released and went to Chechnya where he allied himself with Ruslan Labazanov, a separatist field commander (supported by the federal domestic security forces because he was Dudayev's opponent inside the republic). Khoza was wounded in the fight between Labazanov and Dudayev militants and taken prisoner. Khozh and Ruslan made every effort to set him free. He was released and came back to Moscow, where in 1995 he was shot. A year before killers eliminated Gennady Lobzhanidze.   

During their short terms Atlangeriyev and Islamov were crowned thieves-in-law. They returned to Moscow, where they maintained close-ties with self-proclaimed Chechen government and their associate Nukhayev.

The 1990s became golden age for Lozanskaya group. The group members were involved in the scheme with forged remitting advice letters of the Central Bank. They used money to acquire oil assets and to seize control over a part of Novorossiysk sea terminal. They also cooperated with businessman Boris Berezovsky, who had been their partner since the end of 1980s when he had been a car dealer and sold the automobiles through the firms controlled by the gangsters. Eventually Ruslan and Khozha began to run protection racket for Berezovsky. They helped Berezovsky to protect himself against the organised crime group which threatened AvtoVAZ. Berezovsky not only payed them money but also appointed brigade commander Magomed Ismailov a head of his security service. Nukhaev and Atlangeriyev received a large stake in the Saint Petersburg branch of LogoVaz.    

When in 1994 the oligarch formed his Automobile All-Russia Alliance. This company was «done out» of a billion roubles by the Orekhovskaya criminal group, led by Sergey Timofeyev (Silvestr). The conflict emerged between Berezovsky and Silvestr and there had been an attempt to assassinate the oligarch. Lozanskaya group stepped in and very soon Timofeyev returned money and the issue was settled. Nukhayev actively developed oil assets. He formed Lanako company, which sold fuel. The company was headed by FSB agent Maksim Lazovsky.

Criminal bosses become battle-field generals

Before the First Chechen War, at the end of 1994 all leaders of Lozanskaya group maintained close ties both with the separatists' leaders and Russian security agencies. Lecha Islamov, Balaudi Tekilov and Khozh-Akhmed Nukhayev supported the separatist while Ruslan Atlangeriyev and Mustafa Shidaev supported the FSK (federal counter-intelligence service - future FSB of Russia). The security agencies were falling apart and they had no reliable scheme to work with Chechen criminal bosses (sometimes it was pure cooperation in order to settle business issues). Rarely Chechen mobsters and the agents of security forces carried out operations of very shady character. 

Khozh-Akhmed Nukhaev

For instance, on November 18, 1994, Andrey Shchelenkov, a Lanako's employee, died trying to set up a bomb on the bridge over the Yauza River. On December 17, 1994, there was an explosion in the trolley bus in Moscow (luckily no one was seriously wounded). Two years later Maksim Lazovsky and Aleksey Yumashkin, a Moscow's FSK agent, were arrested on charges of committing this crimes. 6 other security agents were under suspicion.

The FSK claimed Lazovsky organised terrorist attacks following Dudayev's orders. These orders were received through Nukhayev, whereas Yumashkin was infiltrated in Lazovsky's band as a secret agent. According to Aleksandr Litvinenko, the attack was organised by the security forces which wanted to have their hands untied to begin war in Chechnya. In any case, the court acquitted Yumashkin and Lazovsky.  

When the situation in Chechnya became grieve, the security agencies decided to drive Lozanskaya group members into a corner. Ruslan Atlangeriyev was arrested on drug dealing, and Lecha Islamov - on the extortion (he extorted money from an Afganistan businessman). But very soon both were released. Boroda immediately went to Chechnya and later was put on federal wanted list.

When the First Chechen War began, the Lozanskaya group members fought on the separatists' side: Lecha Islamov became a deputy commander of the South-Western Forces of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, Kozh-Akhmed Nukhayev headed the Foreign Intelligence Service of Ichkeria (in 1995) and Balaudi Tekilov became Salman Raduyev's field commander. When in 1996 Dzhokhar Dudayev was liquidated,  Khozh-Akhmed Nukhayev was appointed fire vice-premier in Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev's government. When Aslan Maskhadov seized power in Chechnya, Khozha moved to Azerbaldzhan.

He invested money from car and oil assets into different projects in Azerbaldzhan and Turkey. As a results he posesses slightly less than a half of Baku and numerous objects in Turkey. In the west he gained a reputation of loyal Maskhadov's companion-in-arms, but in fact Maskhadov disliked him, the same feelings he had towards other Lozanskaya group members.

In 1996-1997 the FSB found relyable relationship scheme in the relationship with Lozanskaya gang. The security officers pretended they did not notice the gang's criminal activities (including a group of killers led by Lom-Ali Gaytukayev), whereas the mobsters gave maximum support in special operations and political games with Chechen leaders.

 

Attempt to kill the president

 

First new cooperation experiments of the lozanskaya criminal group and the FSB were accidentally revealed by the prosecutor's office of Vladimir region that was investigating the murder of the football club Spartak head, Larisa Nechayeva.

 

According to the investigators, on June, 14, 1997 after the football game was over, Larissa Nechaeva, her brother Georgy Sorokin, her closest friend Zoya Rudzate, and a good friend, State Customs Committee general, went to spend some time in the village of Taratino in Vladimir region. Suddenly, two unknown men broke into the house. Rudzate was shot in the head, Nechaeva was first shot in the abdomen and then finished off in the back of her head, and Sorokin was shot in the throat. Despite this, the man managed to crawl 40 metres to the banya (a Russian steam bath) and wake up the customs general. He rushed to a nearby cottage where the administrator of Spartak, Alexander Haji, lived. Haji called an ambulance and the police.

Soon the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Prosecutor's Office announced that the crime had been committed by drug addicts from the Moscow region, Alexey Zdor and Vladimir Tenashvili, and that they only aimed to rob the house. They had escaped and were put on the police wanted list. However, the thorough Vladimir investigators questioned this version. They found that the so-called addicts were actually members of a Moscow region criminal group that had connections in law enforcement agencies.

 

Moreover, Zdor and Tenashvili were involved with lozanskaya criminal group. After the murder they fled to the Chechnya republic through the Krasnodar region. The investigation also revealed that at the time the lozanskaya criminal group was directly related to Spartak.

 

The heads of the football club, Yuri Zavarzin and Gregory Yesaulenko, also owned one of the first private Moscow restaurants Razgulyay. Since the late 1980s Razgulay has been the favorite gathering spot for criminal dons. Atlangeriyev was among its frequent guests. He met Zavarzin and Yesaulenko and decided to use Spartak for his business. Ruslan made his brother Turpal Ali Atlangeriyev responsible for all the finance.

 

As a result, lozanskaya criminal group began to produce a soft drink Spartak-Cola, established a real estate agency under the auspices of the football club, and was going to set up a network of gas stations named Spartak.  Oleg Romantsev, Spartak co-owner and head coach of the team, trusted Yesaulenko and Zavarzin completely but from time to time he had fits of suspicion that people around him were making a fool of him. During one of such fits Romantsev invited Larissa Nechaeva to fill the post of head of Spartak. The businesswoman did not like all the projects with lozanskaya criminal group. She started to convince Romantsev to end the projects immediately. She fired one of the Atlangeriyevy’s representatives from an administrative position at the club. As a result, Nechaeva was murdered.

 

As soon it was as possible, in 2001, despite protests from representatives of the Federal Security Service, Vladimir investigators followed Zdor and Tenashvili to Chechnya. There they questioned numerous witnesses, raised the archives of the Ministry of Shariah State Security, and found that after the murder of Nechaeva Moscow region killers settled in Gudermes, unspoken Atlangeriyev’s fiefdom.

 

In summer 1998 the FSB proposed Ruslan to assist in the elimination of Aslan Maskhadov. As the death of the third president of Chechnya was also in line with lozanskaya criminal group interests, the group agreed, but for unknown reasons mandated Zdor and Tenashvili to carry out the murder. On July, 23, 1998, when the presidential motorcade drove through the centre of Grozny, a car parked beside the road exploded. Despite the fact that the Maskhadov‘s Chevrolet was armored, it was badly damaged and it burst into flames. The president of Ichkeria miraculously escaped death. He only got scratches and cuts, but only due to the fact that the bodyguard sitting next to him took the main blow on himself.

 

Tenashvili was immediately arrested and executed by the Ministry of Shariah State Security officers. Zdor managed to hide in Gudermes at his patrons’. But soon they received an order to eliminate the witness.

 

 

 

Mafia serves state security of Russia

 

Up until 1999 lozanskaya criminal group continued to build its relationship with the FSB on the principle of "if it is to our benefit, we will help. If not, go to hell." Events connected to Balaudi Tequilov and Lechy Islamov were especially interesting. By 1997 Balaudi Tequilov, a.k.a. Malysh, was one of the commanders of raduevskaya General Dudayev’s Army, and Lechy Islamov, a.k.a. Boroda, was general of a brigade, commander of Special Forces named after Sheikh Mansur.

 

In 1997 Boroda’s troops captured Anatoly Shapkin and Aslanbek Shortanov, two officers of the North Caucasus RUOP. Representatives of the FSB asked Islamov to free the hostages. However, this would not bring him any profit, so the criminal ignored the security officers. Then they turned for help to Balaudi Tequilov. But Malysh also would not do it for nothing. Only after receiving a large sum of money did he drink the guards and free the captured RUOP officers.

 

In late 1997 another curious story occurred with Tequilov. “In December 1997 there was an announcement that members of the commission for prisoners exchange would come from Chechnya, which the Kremlin then flirted with,” said a former employee of the GUBOP Interior Ministry to a Russian Mafia correspondent (rumafia.com).  “I was in the office at the Sadivo-Spasskaya Street when I heard a delegation walking up the hallway. The door opened and the head of this committee in his dress uniform with a gun and so on, appeared in the doorway. He asked me boldly how long they had to wait and how long it was until someone was there to meet them. The voice was familiar. I looked closer and saw that it was Balaudi Tequilov whom I had been trying to catch for a long time and who was wanted for extortion. To check it I said "Hello, Malysh." I saw his face change. I quickly had him on the floor, took away the gun and handcuffed him. A big fuss broke out. "

 

A year later President Boris Yeltsin signed a decree to pardon Malysh. In return, the Chechen militants agreed to free a representative of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees in the North Caucasus, Vincent Cochetel.

 

Tequilov and Islamov served as the main mediators between security forces and militants when high-profile hostages were let free. Huge ransom accompanied the process, with a share of the money going to the lozanskaya criminal group and some security officials. Boris Berezovsky was also involved in the business. The magnate supplied the militants with money through the lozanskaya criminal group, and helped with international activities. In exchange for his assistance they arranged him a number of PR campaigns thanks to which Berezovsky was internationally recognized as a heavy-weighted politician and even as a peacemaker. It is due to the efforts of the magnet’s accomplices from the lozanskaya criminal group that in 1998 Berezovsky "freed" British citizens Camilla Carr and Joe James from Chechen captivity. Without this frame-up the businessman would hardly be able to feel so confident in London.

 

FSB managed to have tight grip over lozanskaya criminal group only in 1999 when Vice-Admiral Herman Ugryumov, who later headed regional operational headquarters in the North Caucasus, was appointed the first deputy head of the FSB 2nd Department, responsible for protection of constitutional order and combating against terrorism. All his colleagues call Ugryumov a heaven-born counter-intelligence officer. The game of "we will help, if we want to" was unacceptable to him. In fact, he delivered the Chechen kingpins an ultimatum “either you are either with us, or against us”.

 

Ruslan Atlangeriyev and Mustafa Shidaev agreed to be completely loyal to the Federal Security Service. The rest were up for hard luck. Khoj-Akhmed Nukhayev was put on the wanted list for involvement in criminal groups. He is allowed to come to Moscow only when the authorities want him involved in some kind of activities, usually for "showing off" before Western colleagues. In April 2000 Maxim Lazovsky was shot by unknown people in the Odintsovo district in Moscow region. Also in 2000 FSB officers invited Lechy Islamov to a meeting in Chechnya. There he was arrested and sent to remand prison. Boroda was charged with extorting money from an Afghan businessman in early 1990s and the abduction of the North Caucasus RUOP officers. He was sentenced to nine years of incarceration.

 

When put in the cell, Islamov proved more cooperative. When a significant person was kidnapped in Chechnya, Boroda from prison wrote a letter to his former accomplices demanding to release the prisoner. Sometimes it helped. For instance, the militants seized the head of the Samara branch of the Congress of Soviet Women, Svetlana Kuznetsova. The kingpin wrote a note "Let go of the woman, you scums." Soon Kuznetsova was released.

 

But gradually the resource of Boroda exhausted. In April 2004 he died in prison from unknown substance poisoning. Death occurred almost immediately after Islamov drank tea with an FSB officer who came as a visitor.

 

As for Balaudi Tequilov, in 2001 he was found on the outskirts of Grozny with his throat slit.

 

Thus, all the so to say inconvenient FSB agents were dead. But the convenient Atlangeriyev played a huge role in establishing the Kremlin-controlled government in Chechnya. When in 1999 it became obvious that another war could not be avoided, intelligence agencies began looking for a candidate to become president of the republic. And such a candidate was offered by Ruslan. He offered his childhood friend, Ahmad- Hadji Kadyrov. At that time, he was a Chechen mufti and an opponent to Aslan Maskhadov.

 

As a person close to Atlangeriyev told Russian mafia reporters, the first meeting of Herman Ugryumov, Kremlin representatives, and Kadyrov took place in Ruslan’s apartment in Minsk. The candidate was approved. Then a pretext to launch the military operation in Chechnya came about. Militants invaded neighboring Dagestan. Kadyrov and Atlangeriyev actively participated in the fighting on the side of federal forces. So, when Russian troops cordoned off Gudermes with entrenched militants, the thief in law and the mufti had a brief conversation with the militants, his former allies. The militants left the town without firing a shot.

 

In March 2000 Ruslan Atlangeriyev invited the militants’ commander, Salman Raduyev, who then had certain influence, to go to Saudi Arabia and meet with Khoj-Akhmed Nukhayev to settle their conflict and to discuss further funding issues. In accordance with the settled plan, Raduyev arrived in one of the villages, let his guards go, shaved off his beard, and waited for the arrival of the lozanskaya criminal group. Instead, Russian Federation FSB officers broke into the house… In 2002 Raduyev died of some mysterious disease in the prison, where he was serving a life sentence.

 

In October 2000 Ruslan Atlangeriyev offered Turpal Ali Atgeriev, Maskhadov’s right hand and the minister of state security in Chechnya, a trip to Dagestan for negotiations with Herman Ugryumov. On his arrival in Makhachkala Atgeriev was immediately arrested by the FSB. In August 2002 he also died in prison of unknown ailment.

 

For these successful operations Atlangeriyev was awarded several medals, a personal firearm with an inscription, and, according to some reports, even got the rank of colonel. When appointed head of Chechnya, Akhmad-Hadji Kadyrov believed that he owed something to Ruslan. The thief in law enjoyed great influence in the republic. In Moscow, everything went well for him as well. Ruslan had the support of FSB and in the criminal world he acted as an arbitrator. However, all this did not last long.

 

On May, 30, 2001 Herman Ugryumov was awarded the rank of admiral. This event was widely celebrated in the Russian military headquarters in Khankala. The next morning Ugrumov died in his office from a heart attack. Three years later, on May, 9, 2004, Ahmad-Hadji Kadyrov died in the explosion at a stadium in Grozny.

 

After this Atlangeriyev’s status both in Moscow and in Chechnya quickly weakened. FSB needed his services less and less. The last joint operation of the lozanskaya criminal group and security agencies was the elimination of the most notorious Chechen separatist leader Shamil Basayev. Chechen leaders and in particular Lom-Ali Gaytukaev offered him to buy a batch of weapons. Since this was not the first deal between them, Basayev was not suspicious. Security forces placed a number of powerful bombs in the truck with machine guns and grenade launchers. When in July 2006 Basayev began to inspect the purchased firearms, and he always did it himself, a powerful explosion blasted.

 

 

 

Kadyrov sent a KGB agent to shepherd

 

By this time the ruling elite in Chechnya had changed completely. The official president was Alu Alkhanov but nobody in the republic really reckoned with him as they all knew that the Kremlin was about to replace him with Ramzan Kadyrov, son of Ahmad- Hadji. But Ruslan Atlangeriyev, who enjoyed great influence in the republic, did not consider Ramzan equal to himself and treated him as a junior partner.

 

The thief in law consistently told Kadyrov junior what to do. Atlangeriyev suppressed all Ramzan’s attempts to get a share of Chechen criminal groups and businessmen operating in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Ruslan repeatedly made it clear to Kadyrov Jr. that Kadyrov’s father owed him and that the debtor’s son should obey to the kingpin. Ramzan did not like that, especially the mention about the debt of his father. He put up with it for a while but was not going to let the kingpin get away with it.

 

Back in May 2006 in Moscow Mustafa Shidaev, who stood up for the businessman up for tribute to Kadyrov's men, was shot. At the same time an opponent of Kadyrov, commander of a special squad Gorets (Russian for highlander), Movladi Baisarov, was eliminated in Moscow.

 

 In 2007 Ramzan finally became the president of Chechnya. And a year later he finally "repaid all the debts."

 

In February 2008 Atlangeriyev received a call and an invitation to meet from Suleiman Geremeyev (now a member of the Federation Council, and then just a cousin of the close Kadyrov’s associate, Adam Delimkhanov). Unsuspecting Ruslan and his driver came to the restaurant Karetny Dvor in Moscow. There Geremeyev and several other people beat Atlangeriyev, forced him into a car with special permit and took him to Chechnya.

 

In the republic Ramzan personally tried to explain to the thief in law who was in charge in Chechnya. Ruslan was required to announce his associates that he recognized Kadyrov as unquestioned leader, and that the kingpin would from now on be the junior partner. Several times Atlangeriyev was brought to other reputable people, who were suppressed by Ramzan. They tried to persuade Ruslan to recognize the leadership of Kadyrov. At the same time people close to the president of Chechnya were confident that sooner or later lozanskaya criminal group would surrender. His relatives heard sarcastic remarks like "He will just shepherd here for us for a while, and then he will come back to you." But it was all in vain.

 

The criminal old dog did not give up. Then, according to one source, angry Kadyrov’s men shot the recalcitrant criminal don. According to other sources, the man died himself unable to withstand all the abuse.

 

Khoj-Akhmed Nukhayev, unlike most of the lozanskaya criminal group leaders is still alive. Since 1996 he tried to build a political career in the West posing as an ardent fighter against the regime of the USSR and Russia. Khoja said to foreigners that he received his first criminal record not for attacks on students, but for the underground struggle against the Soviets. Then he helped businessmen including Berezovsky, and sometimes he had to act tough, but only in within the political struggle with the regime. Khoja spent raised money exclusively on promoting the independence of Chechnya.

 

People in the West easily believed in those stories and took Nukhayev for a dissident. As a dissident he met with foreign politicians and was interviewed by reporters. Paul Klebnikov, the American journalist who was gathering information about Boris Berezovsky was among the interviewers. They held several meetings in Baku. In 2000 Klebnikov published a book about the magnate called Godfather of the Kremlin: Boris Berezovsky and the looting of Russia.  However, Khlebnikov use did not almost any of the information provided by Nukhayev.

 

Soon Nukhayev began calling himself a "representative of the legitimate Chechen authorities." As a representative he even met with Margaret Thatcher and Zbigniew Brzezinski.

 

And in 2003 a former employee of the Presidential Security Service of the Russian Federation, Valery Streletsky, who owns the publishing house Detective Press, gave an assignment to Khlebnikov to prepare a book on Nukhayev. In the book "Conversation with a barbarian" includes all statements by Nukhayev in which he claimed himself to be almost the main authority in Moscow. The book also reflected detailed stories about in what cases a person can and should be killed and a statement of the radical Islamist views. All this had commentaries of RUBOP officers who investigated lozanskaya criminal group’s activities, making Khoja a common creep.

 

Nukhayev did not like such an arbitrary interpretation of his monologue. He was infuriated even more by the fact that the interview had not been agreed on and that he had not been informed about the release of the books. On July 9, 2004 Paul Klebnikov was shot when leaving the Moscow Forbes office on the Dokukin Street. Nukhayev was put on the international wanted list for this crime.

 

Another lozanskaya criminal group member, Lom-Ali Gaytukaev, is serving a long sentence for the assassination attempt of a Ukrainian businessman.

 

Thus, the once mighty lozanskaya criminal group is now completely destroyed. Those of its leaders, who would not admit of a complete control by the FSB, died resisting. Remaining ones for the most part also went under when no longer needed by security services.