A Russian general has said four interior ministry soldiers died in an ambush by guerrillas in Russia's breakaway Chechnya province.
The Itar-Tass news agency quoted Gennady Troshev, commander of Russian troops in the North Caucasus region, as saying the men had died yesterday when ambushed in the southeastern Nozhai-Yurt district.
Reports said the guerrillas detonated remote-controlled mines as a military convoy passed, then opened fire with automatic weapons. Troshev also said the Russian troops had killed seven rebels in the attack, but both sides tend to exaggerate their enemy's losses.
The Kavkaz.org website, run by rebels close to leading warlord Shamil Basayev, said 11 government soldiers had been killed in an ambush and a 40-minute battle yesterday at Mesker Yurt, a village on a road out of the Nozhai-Yurt district.