MOSCOW, Oct. 20 (Reuters) - One policeman and three militants were killed on Wednesday in a shoot-out in Russia's Kabardino-Balkaria province in the mainly Muslim North Caucasus, news agencies reported.
The Kremlin is struggling to contain an Islamist insurgency along its southern flank, where violence has spread out of its traditional epicentre in Dagestan and Chechnya, and into relatively peaceful regions such as Kabardino-Balkaria.
A policeman was gunned down by militants at 4 p.m. (12:00 GMT) as he inspected a TV tower in Tyrnyauz, about 60 km (37 miles) west of Kabardino-Balkaria’s capital Nalchik, the state-run RIA news agency reported.
The militants were killed when government forces returned fire, it added.
On Tuesday, militants killed three when they attacked the regional parliament of nearby Chechnya, site of two separatist wars with Moscow since the mid-1990s.
