Russia is repeating its request to Britain to extradite self-exiled tycoon Boris Berezovsky in connection with his alleged call for a coup in Russia, a top prosecutor confirmed today.

RUSSIAN soldiers and police searched the city of Nalchik yesterday in the hunt for alleged Islamic militants who launched a series of fierce attacks that left at least 108 people dead.

Security forces today freed seven hostages held by alleged Islamic extremists in a police station and a store, trying to clear the remaining rebels who simultaneously attacked police and government buildings across the southern Russian town of Nalchik yesterday.

Islamic militants attacked police and government buildings in one of the main cities of Russia’s turbulent Caucasus region today, sparking battles in which dozens of people died, officials said.

Six Russian prosecutors today headed to the southern town of Beslan after President Vladimir Putin ordered an investigation of all the facts in last year’s bloody school hostage-taking, in which 331 victims died.