A 20-month war between Chechen rebels and Russian forces followed.

An estimated 100,000 people lost their lives and many Chechen towns and villages were reduced to rubble in the bitter fighting.

Hugely outnumbered and outgunned, Chechen fighters nonetheless outfought badly led and unmotivated Russian conscripts.

Peace accords signed in 1996 gave Chechnya substantial autonomy but not full independence. The Chechen chief of staff, General Aslan Maskhadov, was elected president.

However, Chechnya had been reduced to ruins by the war and Russia failed to invest in reconstruction. General Maskhadov could not control brutal warlords who grew rich by organised crime and kidnapping.

In August 1999, Chechen fighters crossed into the neighbouring republic of Dagestan to support a declaration by an Islamic body of an independent Islamic state in parts of Dagestan and Chechnya.

By now Vladimir Putin was Russian prime minister. He put down the rebellion within a couple of weeks.

The late summer of the same year saw several explosions in Russia in which hundreds died. The Russian authorities blamed the Chechens.

President Putin sent the army back to subdue the republic by force in a second brutal campaign.

The Kremlin called a controversial referendum in March 2003 which approved a new constitution giving Chechnya more autonomy but stipulated it remained a part of Russia.

Some months after the referendum Akhmad Kadyrov was elected Chechen president with strong backing from the Kremlin - but he was assassinated in May 2004.