stepping back in time...THE MICHIGAN DAILY (AP): "FOURTH RUSSIAN BUILDING BOMBED" (ARTICLE SNIPPETS: "His statement came after the latest early-morning explosion at an apartment building. The four explosions together have killed at least 292 people." ..."Yesterday, police discovered a "huge amount" of explosive powder in a southern Moscow suburb, hidden among sacks of sugar from a plant in southern Russia, a spokesperson said. The Interfax news agency reported that the cache was almost 3 1/2 tons. Police also uncovered six timing devices, apparently designed to detonate bombs, the Federal Security Service said.
Yesterday's bomb, hidden in a truck or an underground pipe, sheared off the front of a nine-story apartment building in the city of Volgodonsk, about 500 miles south of Moscow, around dawn, officials said. The blast left a crater 16 1/2 feet deep in front of the building and severely damaged a nearby police station and about 20 other buildings, Interior Ministry officials said.
Traces of explosives were found in the wreckage, the Federal Security Service said. The force of the blast was equivalent to about 100 to 300 tons of TNT, it said." ...
"Volgodonsk, a city of 250,000 people, is close to the volatile North Caucasus Mountains region, where Russian forces have been battling Islamic militants since early August.
Authorities have blamed the three previous apartment explosions - one in the southern city of Buinaksk, and two in Moscow - on the militants. Those explosions claimed 275 lives.
The latest bombing came amid massive security sweeps in Moscow and other major Russian cities. Police have been rounding up thousands of suspects and searching for explosives.
Police in the central Russian region of Tatarstan detained the head of an Islamic organization called Tablik and six of its members, ITAR-Tass reported.
"There is circumstantial evidence that this organization, under the cover of 'pure Islam,' conducted anti-state activities," ITAR-Tass quoted Rinat Timerzyanov, first deputy interior minister of Tatarstan, as saying.
In the Far East, near the port of Vladivostok, security officers found a cache of explosives, grenades and detonators in a wooded area, the Federal Security Service said." (September 17, 1999)
http://www.pub.umich.edu/daily/1999/sep/09-17-99/news/news14.html