A suicide bomber rammed a truckload of explosives into the local police headquarters in Russia's Ingushetia region on Monday killing 20 people, the deadliest attack in the North Caucasus region since 2005. A truck exploded at the gates of the main police station in Nazran, Ingushetia's largest city, as police officers lined up at the start of their day. The number of wounded has risen to 118 people, Interfax reported, citing the emergencies ministry. A police spokesman previously said 74 had been wounded. Thick smoke billowed from the remains of the police station and firemen fought flames near the mangled gate of the compound.
Dozens of people sifted through rubble and wrecked cars were scattered around a 4-metre wide crater. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev offered his condolences and ordered his interior minister to take additional measures to ensure security in the region, which borders Chechnya. "This is a big blow to the Kremlin," said Tatyana Lokshina, an activist with Human Rights Watch who travels regularly to the region. "The number of attacks has been growing for a while, but I can't remember one as brazen as this."
The attack was the bloodiest in Ingushetia since 92 people were killed when Chechen rebels took over the centre of Nazran in 2004. It was the biggest death toll from an attack in the North Caucasus since a similar attack on Nalchik in 2005 in the nearby Kabardino-Balkaria region. Relatives crowded around a hand-written list of the dead at a local hospital and the authorities declared three days of mourning.
There were different estimates of the size of the bomb, but a source in the local prosecutor's office said it was equivalent to one tonne of TNT. "The bomb could be heard throughout the city," said resident Timur Akiyev. Residents were evacuated from a neighbouring apartment block, whose windows were shattered by the blast. Ingushetia has been plagued by violence in recent months. Locals say the insurgency in Ingushetia has been fuelled by a mix of desperate poverty, radicalism and heavy handed actions by the local security services.