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Blasts hit Russia's Dagestan, at least 2 killed

by (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2011. Click For Restrictions. http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp | Thomson Reuters Foundation
Monday, 14 February 2011 21:47 GMT

* Two blasts in Dagestan, examples of nearly daily violence

* Dagestan a centre of Islamist insurgency

(Adds 17 reported injured in second blast, four in first)

MAKHACHKALA, Russia, Feb 14 (Reuters) - A suicide attacker and a car bomb blast targeting police killed at least two people and wounded several on Monday in a village in Russia's Dagestan region, authorities and news reports said.

The bombings were the latest example of the nearly daily violence in Dagestan, one of the hotbeds of an Islamic insurgency the Kremlin is struggling to contain in Russia's mostly Muslim North Caucasus.

A female suicide bomber detonated explosives on Monday evening outside the main police building in Gubden, a village around 150 km (100 miles) south of the provincial capital Makhachkala, the regional Interior Ministry said.

The blast killed one Interior Ministry serviceman guarding the building and wounded four, it said.

About three hours later, a car bomb exploded near a temporary police post on the edge of the village, Russian news agencies reported. Shooting was heard and most of the lights in the village went out.

State-run RIA news agency cited an Interior Ministry official as saying the car bomb was also set off by a suicide attacker and that it killed one police officer and wounded five.

Interfax cited an unidentified law enforcement official as saying one police officer was killed and several wounded, but it also cited an unidentified hospital employee who said 17 people were hurt, most of them police.

Insurgents committed to building an Islamic state across Russia's North Caucasus are believed to be active in Gubden.

Dagestan has become a centre of the insurgency, which has its roots in two post-Soviet wars pitting federal forces against rebels in neighbouring Chechnya. Two female suicide bombers from Dagestan struck in Moscow's metro last March, killing 40 people.

Authorities say a suicide bomber who killed 36 people at Moscow's Domodedovo airport last month was a man from Ingushetia, another North Caucasus province plagued by violence linked to the insurgency. (Additional reporting by Amie Ferris-Rotman; editing by Steve Gutterman and Tim Pearce)

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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