Russia: 'Black Widow' kills police officer

Russia: 'Black Widow' kills police officer


A female suicide bomber killed herself after shooting dead a policeman on Friday in Russia's North Caucasus region, where the Kremlin is struggling to contain an Islamist insurgency, police said.


Suicide bombers have killed more than 50 people and injured 100 in a series of attacks that began on March 29 when two young women blew themselves up on the Moscow metro.


Police said that the woman, wearing a suicide belt, opened fire at them, wounding one policeman who later died.


When police returned fire she blew herself up with the explosive device strapped to her body, officers at the scene told Reuters.


Dressed in a long jeans skirt and black top, her body later lay badly mutilated in a pool of blood.


The shoot-out took place in the village of Ekazhevo in Ingushetia, where senior rebel leader Said Buryatskty was killed in a battle with security forces in early March.


Three other militants were killed in Ekazhevo on Friday in gunfights with police, state-run news agencies reported.


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The officer later died in hospital, police spokeswoman Madina Khadziyeva told AFP.

She said the woman carried a passport issued to Marina Yevloyeva, 25 — a resident of the Nazran district but native of Grozny, the capital of the neighbouring war-torn region of Chechnya.

The Interfax news agency reported investigators had information that the suicide bomber was the wife of one of the three rebels targeted in the special operation.

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Source: Reuters, Vancouver Sun