Two suspected militants were killed on Tuesday, May 21, in a shootout with law-enforcers in Russia’s North Caucasus Republic of Ingushetia, a spokesman for the republic’s investigative department said, according to RIA Novosti.

"We were informed that two suspected militants… were killed in a shootout,” the source said.

He added that no casualties were reported among law enforcers, but the shooting continues.

A counter-terrorism operation was declared at 4:30 Moscow time [00:30 GMT] in Gamurziyevo, a village near the republic’s largest city of Nazran, after it became known that a group of suspected militants took refuge in a private house there.

"During negotiations, a woman and a child left the house. Two or three people refused to lay down arms and engaged in a shootout with law-enforcers,” a police source earlier told RIA Novosti.

Islamist insurgency, once confined largely to the republic of Chechnya, has spread across the North Caucasus in recent years. Attacks on security forces, police and civilians are reported regularly in the neighboring republics of Dagestan, Ingushetia and Kabardino-Balkaria.