Five Russian servicemen killed in Ingushetia ambush

Published Sept. 5, 2012 at 6:01 pm

Chechen Police officers and investigators are seen after a bomb blast, with human body parts in the road in Grozny, Chechnya, southern Russia, on Monday, Aug. 6, 2012. At least three Russian servicemen were killed and another three wounded when a suicide bomber detonated outside a Chechen department store on Monday, officials said. The Investigative Committee said the attack took place in Chechnya's provincial capital, Grozny, and the attacker also died in the explosion.

Photo by AP

ROSTOV-ON-DON, Russia — The Interior Ministry says a small band of insurgents in Russia's violence-plagued Caucasus region has killed five servicemen in an ambush.

The
attack took place near the village of Dattikh in Ingushetia, one of
several Caucasus republics hit by an Islamic insurgency. Ingushetia lies
along the western border of Chechnya, where separatists have fought two full-scale wars with Russian forces over the past two decades.

Violence,
apparently inspired by the Chechen insurgency, has spread to nearby
republics of the multiethnic and predominantly Muslim region.

Interior
Ministry spokesman Mark Tolchinsky said Wednesday that a band of about
10 fighters set off a roadside bomb as a convoy of ministry troops
passed, then opened fire before fleeing into the area’s wooded
mountains.