Ishcherskaya - Russian forces pounded pockets of Chechen resistance along the strategic Terek river yesterday, as Moscow announced it had seized control of a third of the breakaway republic.
In Grozny, President Aslan Maskhadov of Chechnya declared martial law from midnight, mobilising all able-bodied citizens to fight the "Russian aggression" and calling on religious leaders to declare a "Holy War".
The move came as Chechen forces suffered a series of reverses, abandoning for "strategic reasons" the village of Chervlyonnaya on the northern banks of the Terek, just 20km from the northern outskirts of Grozny, a Chechen presidential spokesman said.