Russia: Foils plot to attack 2014 Olympics

The Associated Press

MOSCOW -- Russia says it has foiled a plot to attack the city of Sochi both before and during the 2014 Winter Olympics, saying its agents discovered caches of weapons that included grenade launchers and surface-to-air missiles.

Security officials blamed Chechen separatists and neighboring Georgia. Georgian officials denied any links with the militants, calling the accusations a sign of Moscow's "severe paranoia."

Experts on the Caucasus region said the breakaway Georgian province of Abkhazia, a few miles east of Sochi on the Black Sea, could pose a realistic threat to the security of the games, a pet project of Russian President Vladimir Putin. The region is plagued with near-daily violence linked to an Islamist insurgency that spread from the Russian province of Chechnya to neighboring areas in the 1990s.

Russia's National Anti-Terrorist Committee said the FSB, the successor to the KGB, had discovered 10 caches of weapons and ammunition on May 4-5 in Abkhazia. The FSB suspects the mastermind of the plot is Chechen rebel leader Doku Umarov, who it alleges has close ties to Georgia's secret service. Umarov was said to have coordinated the delivery of the weapons and ammunition to Abkhazia.

Meanwhile, in Greece, the flame that will be carried to London and burn throughout this year's Summer Olympics, which begin July 27, was lit.