Guerrillas carry out coordinated attacks in IngushetiaTimur Aliyev, North Caucasus - Last night a group of armed men, presumably guerrilla fighters, attacked the buildings of the municipal police station and border patrol in the center of Nazran, the largest town in Ingushetia. Similar fighting took place also in the towns of Karabulak, Sleptsovskaya and Nesterovskaya.
An Ingush Interior Ministry source said that the guerrillas came from Chechnya and North Ossetia and tried to seize the police station where a detention center is located.
The battle raged for three hours, killing about fifty people and wounding scores of others.
Our Prague Watchdog correspondent, who had to stay in an office 200 meters from the police station, could hear the guns and grenade launchers going off most of the night.
About thirty policemen were killed along with the acting Interior Minister Abukar Kostoyev and his deputy Ziyadin Kotiyev. According to reports, there were dozens of civilian casualties and several cars were set ablaze.
The fighting finally stopped around 3 a.m. in Nazran, although a helicopter continued to circle above the town.
Residents, who lived in close proximity to the police station and left during the battle, then began to return home.
The press service of the Ingush President Murat Zyazikov announced that the republic would observe three days of mourning. (T/E)
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