Gunmen free four of 41 hostages in south Russia
( 2001-07-31 15:15 ) (7 )

Two masked gunmen took hostage 41 people travelling on a bus in southern Russia on Tuesday but later released two women and two children, local officials said.

A police spokesman, contacted in the regional capital of Stavropol, said the unidentified gunmen who seized the bus at around 7 am (0300 GMT) demanded free passage to the airport in Mineralnye Vody.

Itar-Tass news agency said that according to some reports the gunmen had demanded the release of several guerrillas from the breakaway region of Chechnya who had been seized by Russian troops. Tass gave no details.

The police spokesman said he had no such information.

Interfax news agency later quoted sources in security agencies as saying that the gunmen had demanded direct communication with the government. It did not elaborate.

The police spokesman said that the gunmen released one woman before police stopped the bus by blocking the road with heavy trucks at the village of Kursavka halfway from Stavropol to Mineralnye Vody, about 1,500 km (930 miles) south of Moscow.

He later said that three more hostages had been released.

"They freed four hostages -- two women and two children -- including the one released earlier," the spokesman said by telephone from Stavropol.

The spokesman said that the bus was subsequently allowed to proceed to Mineralnye Vody.

Russian news agencies said that the anti-terrorist unit Alfa and experts trained to negotiate with hostage-takers were expected to arrive in Mineralnye Vody soon.

RIA news agency quoted local police as saying that the freed hostage was wounded in the leg by gunmen. Itar-Tass news agency said that a local police officer, rather than the hostage was injured.

The police spokesman denied both reports. He said: "There were no shootouts and no injured."

Some news agencies said the commuter bus was travelling from the town of Nevinnomyssk to Stavropol, while others said it was moving in the opposite direction.

The Stavropol region borders Russia's volatile North Caucasus, where Russia is fighting separatists in Chechnya.

Russia blamed Chechen separatists for a series of kidnappings in the south in the early 1990s and used the incidents as a reason for moving troops into the rebel province in late 1994.

News agencies said that President Vladimir Putin, who is now at the Black Sea resort of Sochi some 250 km (150 miles) from the scene preparing for the summit of former Soviet states, was immediately informed about the hostage incident.