SHOTLIST
1. Wide shot soldiers outside gift shop
2. Mid shot soldiers standing on corner, AUDIO of gunshots, soldier falls to ground
3. Wide shot more riot police move in
4. Mid shot soldier drags injured soldier away
5. Wide shot armoured personnel carrier (APC) moves in to pick up injured
6. Close-up injured soldier put into APC
7. Wide shot explosion inside store followed by gunshots from inside
8. Three dead gunmen lying in street outside shop
9. Wide shot pan police stand outside police station number 2
10. Mid shot broken windows
11. Mid shot soldier walking outside police station number 2
12. Various damaged police car
13. Wide shot pan police in street
14. Mid shot policeman
15. Jeep stops in street, with AUDIO of gunshots
STORYLINE
All rebel resistance in the southern Russian city of Nalchik has been put down and all hostages have been freed, a day after militants launched a series of attacks in which at least 98 people died, the head of the regional government said on Friday, according to the news agency Interfax.
At least 98 people, including 72 attackers, had been killed in the fighting, according to a tally of accounts by officials, news reports and an Associated Press reporter.
Amid the chaos witnesses said there seemed to be no definitive death toll as yet.
Security forces in Nalchik said they had freed seven hostages held by alleged Islamic militants in a police station and a shop, in a bid to snuff out the remaining rebels who simultaneously attacked police and government buildings across the city on Thursday.
Chechen rebels claimed responsibility for the offensive in Nalchik, the capital of the mostly Muslim republic of Kabardino-Balkariya, as a new front
opened in the Kremlin’s decade-old battle against separatists.
The Chechen rebels’ decade-long struggle against Russia for independence, which saw initial triumph in the first war with Moscow turn to heavy defeat in the second war prosecuted under the leadership of Putin, has melded increasingly with Islamic extremism in recent years and spread far beyond Chechnya’s borders to encompass the whole Russian Caucasus region.
Rounds of heavy weapons fire could be heard about every 20 minutes from the gift shop in the centre of Nalchik on Friday morning. NTV television reported that an armoured personnel carrier had been used to ram a wall of the shop.
Two people believed to be the hostages were taken away in an ambulance, while a traffic policeman said three rebels had been killed.
Russian Deputy Prosecutor General Vladimir Kolesnikov said five police officers had been freed from a precinct station where they had been held by militants, and that eight militants had been killed there.
Seventeen rebels were detained, the RIA-Novosti news agency quoted Russian Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliyev as saying.
Nalchik hospital officials said 103 people were being treated for injuries, according to the ITAR-Tass news agency.
Bloodied bodies from Thursday’s fighting still lay in the streets on Friday.
A man’s body lay near the entrance to police station No. 2 and the regional anti-terrorist centre, where most of the windows had been blown out
and even tramway lines outside had been brought down.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, beleaguered by attacks that have killed hundreds of civilians and underscored his failure to bring the turbulent Caucasus under control, ordered a total blockade of Nalchik to prevent militants from slipping out and ordered security forces to shoot any armed
resisters.
Estimates of the number of militants involved ranged from 60 to 300, and Interfax quoted an aide to the president of Kabardino-Balkariya as saying late Thursday that 17 had been detained.
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Post time: Jun-19-2017