Powerful blasts shake Russia's Dagestan, at least two injured

At least two people were injured by two consecutive powerful explosions that occurred in Russia's volatile North Caucasus region of Dagestan on Tuesday night.

The blasts rocked the downtown Imam Shamil Avenue in the Sovetsky district of regional capital of Makhachkala at about 9:20 p.m. Moscow time (1720 GMT) on Tuesday with an interval of 10 minutes and a distance of some 50 meters, local media reported.

The first explosion set off under the BMW car of the son of Kamil Etinbekov, a former official of the Federal Security Service (FSB), while the second exploded inside a trash can.

Forensic experts were working at the scene.

Another relative of the late Etinbekov, a senior police officer who had been killed in 2004 in an act of terror, was also injured in the first blast.

Both victims were severely wounded and have been hospitalized, said the RIA Novosti news agency.

However, the Interfax news agency said the second blast occurred at the same place some half an hour later, with no reports on possible casualties so far.

"The circumstances of the incident have yet to be determined," said a city police source.

On early Tuesday, two police officers were also shot dead in Makhachkala, when unidentified assailants opened fire at a traffic police post during a security check.

Russia's North Caucasus republics, particularly Chechnya, Dagestan and Ingushetia, have been plagued by violence, particularly against law enforcement officers, which local rebels see as representing the Russian authorities.

On Monday a bomb exploded under the car of Beslan Shadiyev, deputy interior minister of the neighboring republic of Ingushetia, injuring four people.

A spate of terrorist attacks have prompted Russian authorities to tighten security measures across the country.

The Russian Emergency Situations Ministry earlier this month announced plans to set up an emergency center for possible crisis in the North Caucasus Federal District, the eighth federal district of Russia established in January that includes the republics of Dagestan, Ingushetia, Kabardino-Balkarian, Karachayevo-Cherkessian, North Ossetia-Alania and Chechen, as well as the Stavropol territory.

Source: Xinhua