VLADIKAVKAZ - Officials in Chechnya on Tuesday began investigating reports of abuses by Russian forces during an eight-day security sweep of two villages in the separatist region. Russian troops cordoned off the villages of Starye Atagi and Novye Atagi last week to look for rebels believed to be hiding there. On Monday, villagers who managed to break out of the cordon, told The Associated Press that Russian troops robbed houses in the villages, beat and arbitrarily detained local men, and stripped young women of their clothes and harassed them.

A special commission set up by Chechnya's pro-Moscow leader, Akhmad Kadyrov, began investigating the allegations, the Interfax and ITAR- Tass news agencies reported.

Shakhid Zhamaldayev, chief of the Grozny district administration, said reports that the troops beat village leader Vakha Gadayev and disarmed and detained nine village policemen had been confirmed, according to Interfax.

The so-called "mopping-up" operations were continuing in both villages Tuesday, as well as in Chiri-Yurt, Duba-Yurt and Goity, an official in the Moscow-appointed Chechen administration said on condition of anonymity.

ITAR-Tass quoted Grozny district officials as saying that Starye Atagi and Novye Atagi were running out of food reserves.

Such security sweeps have long been the target of criticism by Chechen residents and international human rights organizations, who say troops frequently loot houses and abuse and even kill civilians. Russian officials insist there are only isolated incidents of abuse.

Elsewhere in the region, the chief of the Vedeno district administration, Kazbek Selimov, said three houses were destroyed and a dozen farm animals killed when the village of Tsa-Vedeno came under fire on Tuesday. Nobody was injured, Interfax quoted him as saying. He said authorities were investigating who had opened fire on the village.

Over the past 24 hours, rebels fired on federal outposts eight times, killing two troops and wounding 11 others, the administration official said. Rebels clashed with riot police near the village of Goity, the official said. One police officer and one rebel were killed, and two rebels were taken prisoner.

In Grozny, the capital, a military truck was blown up by a remote-controlled mine, killing one police officer. Another police officer died from wounds he received when his patrol car hit a land mine, the official said. In Gudermes, the region's second-largest city, a sapper was killed trying to defuse a mine, the official said.

Both wars led to a massive exodus of refugees from Chechnya, but officials say civilians are now returning. More than 200,000 refugees have returned over the past year, Chechnya's prime minister, Stanislav Ilyasov, said. He said the population of the region was estimated at 800,000, according to ITAR-Tass.

The agency quoted the head of Chechnya's emergency department, Ruslan Avtayev, as saying there are 162,000 Chechen refugees still living in neighboring regions.

The Associated Press