'LeT training militants in Chechnya'

Pakistan-sponsored terror outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba has trained militants even in Chechnya, from where the Tsarnaev brothers who have been accused in the Boston marathon bombings hail, former Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) official Amber Sen said Saturday.

LeT operations in Chechnya had been exposed after the Spanish police arrested Chechen terrorists who claimed to have been trained by the LeT, said Sen, former special secretary of RAW and strategic intelligence advisor to the National Security Council (NCS), while delivering a lecture on terrorism in India and beyond, at the International Centre here.

Sen said that Chechnya also shared a border with Dagestan, another Russian state bordering Chechnya along the northern and eastern border, which was funneling in terror elements.

"Dagestan is a disturbed area. Islam is increasingly getting an upper hand there. 10 years ago there were 10 mosques in Dagestan and now there are 2000," Sen said.

The LeT is one of the most dreaded terror outfits operating in Indian and have been accused of carrying out the 26/11 terror strikes in Mumbai in 2008.

The Tsarnaev brothers, Tamerlan and Dzhokhar have been accused of carrying out terror-strikes at the Boston Marathon last month are ethnic Chechens from the violence-ridden area located at the foothills of the Caucasian mountain range.