Blast in south Russia's Dagestan injures four

Blast in south Russia's Dagestan injures four

"An unidentified explosive device went off at 10:05 local time (06:05 GMT) not far from the market in Kizilyurt [a town west of the republic's capital Makhachkala]. The blast went off when a police patrol was passing by. Four people, including two police officers, were injured," a ministry official said.

He said investigation was underway.

Russia's mainly Muslim North Caucasus republics have been swept by a wave of violence in recent months, with attacks on troops, police and other officials a daily occurrence.

Neighboring Ingushetia saw its deadliest attack in years on Monday. A suicide bomber rammed an explosives-laden minivan into the gates of the police headquarters in the republic's largest city Nazran, killing at least 20 people and injuring 138, mainly civilians.

President Dmitry Medvedev dismissed Ingushetia's interior minister on Monday and ordered a probe into police performance in the wake of the bombing.

NAZRAN, August 18 (Itar-Tass) - There are a total of 38 injured in the Monday suicide bombing undergoing treatment at the Ingush Clinical Hospital. Four of them are in medium gravity condition, Itar-Tass was told at the reception ward of the medical establishment.

The medics said that on Monday 33 injured, including heavily, were transported for treatment to Rostov-on-Don, Vladikavkaz and Moscow. Ten injured were airlifted to Moscow overnight to Tuesday. Doctors of the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry and the All-Russia Disaster Medicine Centre “Zashchita” were accompanying them during the flight.

The clinic’s reception ward disproved information that another person died at hospital overnight. According to latest information of the RF Emergency Situations Ministry, the death toll of the Nazran terrorist act is 20 and 138 injured, including 10 children.

On Monday morning a suicide bomb attacker driving a Gazelle light truck steered his vehicle through the gate of a local police station, as police officers lined up in the yard for the morning check and detonated the explosive device. According to preliminary estimates, the bomb’s yield measured up to one tonne of TNT. The blast left a crater four meters wide and 1.5-2 meters deep. Ingushetia’s acting President Rashid Gaisanov declared August 17-19 as days of mourning. “During the days of mourning, all cultural and entertaining events are cancelled,” the presidential press service told Itar-Tass on Monday.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev expressed condolences to the next-of-kin as a result of the terrorist act in Ingushetia. Medvedev instructed Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev to take additional measures in order to establish order in the Ingush Interior Ministry and give proposals to consolidate the staff. The president also instructed the interior minister to provide any assistance.

The Ingush government will render material aid to all victims of the explosion. Families of those died in the blast will be paid 100,000 roubles and injured people will receive 50,000 roubles, spokeswoman for the Ingush government Zhanna Almazova said on Monday.

Plane with 9 victims of terrorist act in Nazran lands in Moscow

http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=14242507&PageNum=0

MOSCOW, August 18 (Itar-Tass) - A plane of the Russian Ministry for Emergency Situations with nine people seriously injured in the Monday terrorist act in Nazran on board has landed in Moscow, sources from the ministry’s information department told Tass.

They said an Il-76 transport plane, which took off from the airport of Beslan (North Ossetia) at 00:10 Moscow time on Tuesday, landed in Moscow at 2:25 am. The plane is equipped with four special ambulance modules. The wounded passengers were accompanied by medics. They were transported from Domodedovo airport to Moscow clinics.

Twenty people were killed and 136 were injured when a suicide bomber rammed a light truck into a police station in the capital of Russia’s southern republic of Ingushetia.

FACTBOX-Key facts about Russia's region of Ingushetia

http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSLH205142
Mon Aug 17, 2009 6:56am EDT

Aug 17 (Reuters) - A suicide bomber detonated a truck packed with explosives on Monday at a police headquarters in Russia's Ingushetia region, killing at least 19 people and wounding 68.

For the latest story, click on [ID:nLH532762]

The following are key facts about Ingushetia:

* Ingushetia has be plagued by violence in recent months and analysts say the situation is spiralling out of control, threatening to undermine the Kremlin's policy in the North Caucasus.

* Ingush President Yunus-Bek Yevkurov was seriously wounded in a suicide bomb attack in June. He was treated in Moscow and is still not back at work. At his first public appearance since the attack, the 46-year-old former paratrooper general pledged to step up the fight against rebels.

* Locals say the insurgency in Ingushetia has been fuelled by a mix of desperate poverty, Islamic radicalism and heavy handed actions by the local security services. Russian and Ingush officials say publicly that corruption is at shocking levels, adding to the vast gulf between the region's rulers and its population of around half a million.

* The smallest region in Russia, Ingushetia is wedged between North Ossetia and Chechnya. It is one of Russia's poorest regions with an estimated unemployment rate of over 50 percent as of March this year. Over 90 percent of Ingushetia's revenue comes in the form of subsidies from Moscow.

* The Sufi branch of Islam is Ingushetia's main religion. It is one of 21 republics within Russia and has nominal autonomy with its own president, parliament and constitution.

* The Soviet Union lumped ethnically close Ingushetia and Chechnya together, but after its 1991 fall, Chechnya declared independence and Ingushetia chose to become a republic within Russia.

* Relations between Ingushetia and North Ossetia are strained. Paramilitary groups fought a brief war in 1992 over a disputed district. Hundreds died and thousands became refugees.

* Ruslan Aushev was Ingushetia's president from 1992-2001. He steered Ingushetia away from the conflict in Chechnya, where rebels fought federal forces in two wars from 1994. Backed by Russian leader Vladimir Putin, Murat Zyazikov, an ex-KGB general, took over as president in 2002. In October last year, President Dmitry Medvedev appointed Yevkurov as the region's new boss. Yevkurov clamped down on corrupt officials and proposed a poverty reduction programme in a bid to prevent people from yielding to radical Islam.

* During the second Chechen war which began in 1999, Ingushetia was the destination for thousands of Chechen refugees. Since 2002, Russian special forces have cracked down on rebels in Ingushetia. Around 90 people died in a rebel attack on the city of Nazran in 2004. (Writing by Dmitry Solovyov and Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

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