Five women have reportedly been killed after a gunman opened fire at a church service in the Russian republic of Dagestan.
The BBC reports that five others – including a police officer and a national guardsman – were injured in the attack.
It took place as people were leaving an evening church service in the city of Kizlyar. TASS news agency reports that the 22-year-old gunman was shot dead by police while trying to flee the scene.
The so-called Islamic State have claimed responsibility for the attack.
A spokesman for the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, said the patriarch was “stunned” by the attack and demanded a thorough investigation.
“The Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church considers this terrible crime, committed on the eve of the Great Lent, a provocation aimed at instigating confrontation between Orthodoxs and Muslims, who have been coexisting peacefully for ages in the Caucasus,” the spokesman wrote in a telegram.