Prior to the 1990s, there were 180 regiments (of varying size) of interior troops, of which 90 were mainly guards of correctional institutions, important public facilities and public order.

Officials Go on TV About 5,000 soldiers, along with 6,000 interior troops, were reported in the first wave ordered in Tuesday to supplement those already stationed there during many months of tension.

Even if the Russians manage to subdue Chechnya, they plan to station an army division and a brigade of the interior troops indefinitely in the breakaway republic to fend off guerrilla attacks.

His visit came as hundreds of Georgian police and interior troops set up checkpoints in the region in an effort to establish order, as Russia has long demanded.

More than 50,000 police and 2,000 interior troops, backed by water cannon, helicopters and reinforced arrest lorries, have been deployed in the city.

Capt. Alikhan Gaisanov, commander of a detachment of Russian interior troops who fought there, said the rebels had fired five missiles at the helicopter.

General Popkov, the commander of interior troops, said he was notified of Ms. Tymoshenko's words and the crowd's restlessness, and ordered the alarm.

A roadside ambush in Chechnya killed seven Russian interior troops and wounded another on Tuesday, the region's prosecutor, Valery A. Kuznetsov, said in a telephone interview.

A Georgian parliamentary commission which was established to investigate the incident later concluded that the interior troops had carried out a 'punitive action - a planned mass massacre, committed with especial cruelty'.

He also mentions Fahmin Hajiyev, the head of Azerbaijan's interior troops of the country who spent 11 years in prison because of the Khojaly events.