5 officials killed in Russia's violent south

Militants in Russia's restive south fatally shot five law enforcement personnel in separate attacks, authorities said Wednesday.

Two police officers and two elite troops were killed in Chechnya late Tuesday when police engaged in an hour-long gunfight with up to 15 suspected insurgents, who subsequently fled into woodland, Chechnya's interior ministry said in a statement.

In neighboring Ingushetia, a court bailiff and a relative were gunned down in their car late Tuesday by unidentified assailants, according to Svetlana Gorbakova, a spokeswoman for the province's investigative committee.

Law enforcement officials die daily in violence that plagues the country's North …