RIA Novosti quoted Russian interior ministry sources as saying that all of the victims from the remote-controlled blast, which occurred on Monday, were civilians. It was the worst landmine blast to to hit Chechnya in nearly two years.

Six people died on the spot and another 12 died overnight in hospital, officials told the news agency. Three people remain hospitalized following the attack.

The Russian military blamed the strike on Chechen guerrillas, although no one has yet claimed responsibility, and a rebel Internet site has published a denial.

The landmine blast was the worst to hit the North Caucasus republic since December 2000, when 22 civilians were killed in an attack in the southeastern village of Alkhan Yurt.

The Russian prosecutor in Chechnya said Tuesday the explosion went off shortly after two Russian military vehicles had driven by. The blast appeared to have been aimed at the federal troops, he said.

Instead, the explosion devastated a packed civilian bus at it passed by the central Grozny intersection at the same time.

"It was absolutely impossible to predict that the terrorists would strike this street, which is not heavily policed because it is a main city thoroughfare," prosecutor Nikolai Kostyuchenko told Interfax news agency.

Russian media reports said two children were among the victims. Body parts were strewn 15 meters (yards) from the site, the reports said.

However the guerrillas denied responsibility for the attack, with the rebel-run Kavkaz Internet site suggesting that the blast was a provocation staged by federal troops "aimed at psychologically intimidating Chechen civilians."

Federal troops stormed into separatist Chechnya in October 1999 in what Moscow termed an anti-terrorist operation, which has since turned into a brutal guerrilla war with daily casualties on both the rebel and federal side.

The war has claimed the lives of at least 4,500 Russian soldiers and some 14,000 guerrillas, according to Moscow's figures.

The civilian toll from the war has never been published.

zak/hm/ds Nampa-AFP WEB story ENDS (NAMPA 170923)

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