A suspected bomb blast killed 11 people outside a Russian market in one of the worst attacks in months to hit Russia's turbulent North Caucasus region.
The explosion detonated as a minibus taxi pulled up outside the main market in the southern Russian city of Vladikavkaz, killing passengers and ripping the doors off one side of the vehicle. Prosecutors said they suspect a terrorist attack.
The attack was fresh evidence that despite largely quelling a separatist rebellion in nearby Chechnya, Russia is still struggling to contain violence in its southern regions that has fuelled instability and killed thousands of people.
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev ordered police and state security agencies to tighten security and to keep him informed about the investigation into the blast, according to the Kremlin press service.
Vladikavkaz is in Russia's North Ossetia region, scene of the Beslan siege in 2004 in which more than 300 people were killed after their school was taken hostage by gunmen linked to a separatist rebellion in Chechnya.
"Today in the centre of Vladikavkaz an explosion occurred as a result of which 11 people were killed," the investigative unit of the Prosecutor General's Office said in a statement. "A criminal case has been opened ... (for) murder and terrorism."
North Ossetian leader Taimuraz Mamsurov, quoted by Interfax news agency, had conflicting figures for casualties, saying his initial information was that eight people were killed.
Regional health minister Vladimir Lekoyev said more than 30 people were injured in the explosion, including one child, Itar-Tass news agency reported. He said of the injured, 10 were in a serious condition.
Russian news agencies quoted law enforcement agencies as saying the cause of the blast was a bomb.
Reuters