Militants launched simultaneous attacks on police and government buildings in one of the main cities in Russia’s turbulent Caucasus region today, sparking battles involving heavy-arms fire and explosions that forced the evacuation of schools and left bodies in the streets.

RUSSIAN president Vladimir Putin said yesterday the Kremlin was preparing to take preventative action against terrorists, even as a Chechen rebel leader purportedly claimed responsibility for a series of attacks that killed hundreds of people and threatened further violence.

Radical Chechen rebel leader Shamil Basayev purportedly took responsibility today for a recent series of deadly terrorist attacks in Russia, but put the ultimate blame for the massacre of more than 330 people held hostage in a school on Russian President Vladimir Putin.