Islamic militant suspects 'shot dead'

Security forces today stormed an apartment building in southern Russia where a small group of suspected Islamic militants had barricaded themselves, probably killing all the rebels, police said.

A heavy firefight broke out early today, said an officer in the Interior Ministry department in Nalchik, the capital of Kabardino-Balkariya, where the day-old stand-off came to an end. Security forces used grenade launchers to lob canisters of tear gas into the building before entering, he said.

The forces broke down the metal door to the apartment but there was too great a concentration of gas for them to enter, he said. A fire had broken out in the apartment.

He said it was not yet known how many militants had been in the apartment, but it was believed there were four to five based on an initial survey of the damage.

There was “a 90 % probability” all the militants had been killed, said the officer.

The suspects had been holed up inside a second-floor apartment in the latest in a series of confrontations between law-enforcement authorities and alleged extremists in the volatile North Caucasus region, which includes Chechnya.

Last month, security forces killed seven alleged Islamic extremists in the same city in a two-day battle with members of the so-called Yarmuk group.