ROSTOV-ON-DON, Russia (AP): Two soldiers and a police official have been killed in attacks in the republic of Ingushetia and another soldier has been killed in neighboring Chechnya, Russian authorities said on Friday.

Ingushetia has suffered a rising wave of attacks on security forces and officials in recent months. Responsibility for the attacks is uncertain, and observers attribute them variously to criminals, Islamist fighters and opponents of the republic's president.

Russia's Interior Ministry said Friday that gunmen in a car fired on a military convoy the previous day, killing two soldiers. Also Thursday, the head of a district police division was killed when his car was fired on, the ministry said.

In Chechnya, where fighting between troops and separatists has been at a low level in recent years, a soldier was killed during the night by three gunmen as he walked to his quarters in the Shali region, the Chechen Interior Ministry said.