Elistanzhi cluster bomb attack

{{Short description|1999 Russian massacre in Chechnya}}

{{Infobox civilian attack

|title=Elistanzhi bombing

|image=

|caption=

|location=Elistanzhi, Chechnya

|target=Demilitarized village

|date=October 7, 1999

|time=

|timezone=

|type=Cluster bombing

|fatalities=At least 34

|injuries=At least 20

|perps=Russian Air Force

|motive=

|coordinates= {{Coord|42.971|46.017|display=title}}

}}

{{Campaignbox Second Chechen War}}{{Campaignbox Second Chechen War civilian attacks}}

Elistanzhi cluster bomb attack occurred on October 7, 1999, in Chechnya, when two Russian Sukhoi Su-24 fighter bombers dropped several cluster bombs on the apparently undefended mountain village of Elistanzhi.

The bombing killed at least 34 (48 according to some reports) and injured some 20 to over 100 people in the small village, mostly women and children; at least nine children were reportedly killed when one bomb hit the local school. Witnesses and victims stated that there were no military objectives in the village prior to or at the time of the attack. Representatives of the Russian human rights group Memorial visited Elistanzhi shortly after the bombing and found no evidence of any Chechen separatist military presence in the village.[http://www.memo.ru/eng/hr/ch991018.htm The report on the Observer mission to the zone of the armed conflict] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303180740/http://www.memo.ru/eng/hr/ch991018.htm |date=2016-03-03 }}, Memorial, October 18, 1999