Georgia Says It Killed Suspect in 2016 Bombing at Istanbul Airport<br />1, 2017<br />TBILISI - A former Islamic State fighter suspected of masterminding a deadly attack on Istanbul airport in 2016 was killed during<br />a special operation in ex-Soviet Georgia last week, a spokeswoman for Georgia’s state security service said on Friday.<br />"It’s confirmed that one of those killed during the operation is Akhmed Chatayev," Nino<br />Giorgobiani, a spokeswoman for Georgia’s state security service, told a news briefing.<br />A veteran of Chechnya’s conflict with Moscow during which he lost an arm, he lived in Georgia’s Pankisi Gorge, a remote area populated<br />largely by people from the Kist community, ethnic Chechens whose ancestors came to mainly Christian Georgia in the 1800s.<br />Giorgobiani declined to name the two other armed men killed or disclose the identity of the<br />member of the group who was arrested, the group’s motives, or how they got to Georgia.<br />Chatayev was wounded and arrested in Georgia in August 2012 following a clash between the Georgian police<br />and a group of militants, who were allegedly trying to cross the Georgian-Russian border and move to Dagestan.<br />Giorgobiani said that The investigation is ongoing ... We continue to work with our international partners to identify the other two (armed men),
