Rebels launch attacks in southern Russia
(AP)
Updated: 2005-10-13 20:03

Interfax said security forces had repelled an attack at the airport. All flights were canceled.

The militants also attacked the regional headquarters of the Russian prison system, the Emergency Situation Ministry's press office said. Interfax said that a border guards' office also came under attack.

An Associated Press reporter saw three bodies in one street in the city center near government buildings: one in police uniform, one man with a gun and one in civilian clothes.

A teacher from School No. 5, who gave only his first name, Spartak, said students had been evacuated from the building, located close to a police station and an anti-terrorism office at the center of the attacks. Black smoke billowed from the building as panic-stricken parents searched for their children in the school yard.

Shooting continued an hour after the attacks reportedly began and windows and doors in the local office of the Federal Security Service were smashed. Snipers crouched on the building's roof and soldiers in masks and camouflage were in the streets, where two armored personnel carriers were parked.

A crowd of bystanders stood about 100 yards away from the building, and there appeared to be no effort to cordon off the site of fighting to prevent more casualties.

Federal forces blocked off much of the city of 235,000, but intense shooting from automatic rifles and grenade-launchers could be heard in the center.

Nalchik is about 60 miles northwest of Beslan, where Chechen rebels raided a school in September 2004, taking hundreds of hostages. More than 330 people, half of them children, died in the raid, which ended in explosions and gunfire after three days.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered security forces to deal more severely with suspected Islamic militants in the south. Law-enforcement agencies have launched a series of sweeps targeting suspected extremists outside Chechnya.