4 suspected militants killed in Russia's Dagestan

Russian authorities say police have killed five people including a prominent warlord in a clash in the restive North Caucasus republic of Dagestan.

Rasul Temirbekov, spokesman for the Russian Investigate Committee, said police stormed a house in the town of Buinaksk today morning, killing the owner of the house and four men.

Investigators said that among the four killed was 50-year-old Bammatkhan Sheikov, a prominent warlord who was said to be competing to oversee all militant operations in Dagestan.

Sheikov was sentenced to three years in prison for insurgency in 2008 after he turned himself in and laid down arms.
 

Dagestan has become the epicenter of an Islamic insurgency that has spread through the Caucasus region after two separatist wars in Chechnya.