/ 30 December 2013

Fresh attack in Russia leaves many dead following suicide bombing

Police block the way to a Volgograd train station after a female suicide bomber blew up the entrance hall
Police block the way to a Volgograd train station after a female suicide bomber blew up the entrance hall

Ten people were killed on Monday in a blast on a trolleybus in the southern Russian city of Volgograd, a day after a deadly suicide bombing at the city's main train station, officials said.

"According to initial information, 10 people were killed and 10 were wounded" in the explosion, the spokesperson of the local branch of the emergencies ministry Irina Gogoleva told the Interfax news agency.

Reports said that the blast was so strong that the trolleybus – a common form of municipal transport in Russian cities – was completely destroyed.

Russian news agencies quoted unnamed local officials as saying that the blast was likely to have been an attack. "This is another act of terror, this time in a trolleybus," a investigative source told RIA Novosti.

Another source told the ITAR-TASS news agency that the blast could have been caused by a suicide bomber.

Sochi Olympic Games
A suicide bomber killed 17 people on Sunday in the attack on the train station of Volgograd, heightening security fears just six weeks before the Sochi Olympic Games.

The death toll from Sunday's attack rose to 17 from 16 overnight after another victim died in hospital of his wounds, the health ministry said. – AFP