Some 35 corpses have been foundand more were expected at the site of an explosion thatdemolished a military hospital today in a Russian regionbordering rebellious Chechnya, Interfax news agency quoted a state prosecutor as saying.
Interfax quoted Deputy Prosecutor General Sergei Fridinskyas saying 150 people were in hospital, including 100 patients.
The death toll, he said, was likely to rise.
Eyewitnesses said the blast was caused by a man driving atruck into the hospital complex.
"Ruins are all that remain of the hospital," said a military spokesman.
They four storey red brick building was completely destroyed in the blast inthe city of Mozdok in Russia's North Ossetia region, said the region's EmergencySituations Minister Mr Boris Dzgoyev.
The building collapsed like a house of cards, Mr Dzgoyev said. He said that afire broke out, but firefighters managed to put out the blaze in less than twohours.
Ms Alina Totykova, deputy head of the North Ossetian regional hospital in theregional capital Vladikavkaz, said all available ambulances were sent toMozdok.
There was a serious shortage of medicine, anaesthetics and bandages and asevere shortage of blood, she said, adding that an appeal for people to giveblood would be broadcast on television.
Interfax said a truck packed with explosives crashed through the hospitalgates, with a suicide bomber behind the wheel.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, the latest inan upsurge of suicide bombings that have killed more than 100 people in andaround Chechnya and in Moscow since May. which followed a series of suicidebombings in and around Chechnya in recent months.
Mozdok is the headquarters for Russian forces fighting in Chechnya and hasbeen targeted by attackers before.
In June, a female suicide attacker detonated a bomb near a bus carryingsoldiers and civilians to work at a military airfield near Mozdok, killing atleast 16 people.
In May in Chechnya, a suicide truck-bombing killed 72 people and a woman blewherself up at a religious ceremony, killing at least 18 people. AP/Reuters