RUSSIAN authorities have foiled a plot by militants who were building fertiliser bombs in a suburban apartment and planning to attack a bullet train between Moscow and St Petersburg, a newspaper reported.

Six policemen and nine militants have been killed in separate shootings in Russia’s violence-plagued North Caucasus, police said today.

Three prison guards have been killed in a drive-by shooting at a bus stop outside a correctional facility for women in southern Russia.

A suicide bomber has killed four police officers and wounded five people in the provincial capital of Chechnya.