Ten Russian troops wounded in remote-controlled mine blast in southern Russia

Ten Russian servicemen were wounded when an unknown assailant detonated a remote-controlled mine on a highway in southern Russia, police said Tuesday.

The soldiers were in a military convoy traveling on the Kavkaz highway in the republic of Ingushetia when a mine exploded, hitting trucks but causing no injuries, said Alexei Polyansky, spokesman for the southern branch of the Russian Interior Ministry. A second mine was detonated after police arrived on the scene, and 10 soldiers were wounded, two of them seriously, he said.

The incident occurred in the vicinity of the regional capital, Magas. The territory neighbors Chechnya, where separatist rebels have been fighting Russian forces for most of the past decade.

AP