Death toll in Russian blast rises to 10
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-06-05 18:33

Two more people died of injuries suffered in the bombing of a busy outdoor market in central Russia, raising the death toll to 10, officials said Saturday.

In this image taken from Russian television, body parts are seen at the scene of an explosion in Samara, Russia, some 800 kilometers (500 miles) southeast of Moscow, Friday, June 4, 2004.[AP]

Dozens were wounded in Friday's blast in the Volga River city of Samara, 500 miles southeast of Moscow. The marketplace was packed at the time.

Officials initially blamed the explosion on a leaky gas canister, but later said it was caused by a bomb.

Two victims died at a hospital, bringing the death toll to 10, said a spokesman for the local branch of Russia's Emergency Situations Ministry. He asked not to be named. Another 38 people remained hospitalized, some in grave condition.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility and no indication whether the explosion was connected to terrorists or one of the commercial disputes that often turn violent in Russia.

The plastic explosive was placed on the back wall of one of the kiosks near a railway that ran alongside the market, officials said.

A series of market explosions have plagued the North Caucasus city of Vladikavkaz in recent years, including a May 1999 bombing that killed 55 people at the central market and a 2001 blast at the same market that killed six.

Two men convicted in the latter bombing allegedly were paid to set it off by rebels from the nearby separatist republic of Chechnya, where Russian troops have been fighting separatist rebels for nearly five years.

But commercial and criminal disputes also often involve bombings and street shootings. A 2000 bombing that killed 13 people in a kiosk-lined underground passage in Moscow was initially blamed on Chechen rebels, but authorities later said it also could be part of a turf battle between businessmen or criminal gangs.

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