A policeman was killed and another nine officers were wounded Monday in a restive province in southern Russia, officials said.

The policeman died when unidentified attackers fired several grenades at the headquarters of the regional branch of Russia's Interior Ministry. The ministry said three other people were wounded in the attack in Nazran, the main city of the province of Ingushetia west of Chechnya.

Later on Monday, police found a grenade launcher attached to the fence of a kindergarten across the street from the Federal Border Guards's headquarters in Nazran. When police and explosives experts arrived at the site, the booby-trapped weapon exploded but hurt no one.

As the team of experts began analyzing fragments left by the blast, a second explosive device detonated, injuring six police officers, said Andrei Karnitsky, a spokesman for the Emergency Situations Ministry's branch in southern Russia.

Ingushetia and other provinces in Russia's North Caucasus have seen an upsurge of violence stemming from two separatist wars in Chechnya.

In the province of Dagestan, east of Chechnya, police killed two suspected militants early Monday when the men opened fire at officers who had stopped their car, said Mark Tolchinsky, a spokesman for the regional branch of Russia's Interior Ministry.

Copyright © 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.