A man tried to bring a suspicious package to a polling station in Chechnya yesterday, then died in an explosion as he ran away, the head of the Chechen election commission said on Russian television.
The blast came as Chechens voted for a president to replace the Kremlin-backed leader who was killed in a bomb blast in May.
Details were sketchy on the incident in the Chechen capital of Grozny.
When guards at the polling station asked to see the package, "He began to run. It blew up. He died," elections commission head Abdul-Kerim Arsakhanov said in comments shown on the NTV television channel.
No other casualties were reported and the polling station continued to operate, according to NTV.
The election is part of the Kremlin's strategy to try to undermine support for separatist rebels who have been fighting Russian forces for nearly five years by inducing a semblance of civil order in the ruined southern republic.
An election last October based on that strategy brought Akhmad Kadyrov to power, but Kadyrov was killed in a bomb blast in Grozny in May and fighting and violent crime have continued unabated.
"People are sick of the fighting," said Tashtyela Yarnasa, 65, a pensioner who came to vote at a heavily guarded school in the eastern Chechen town of Oiskhara. "I'm hoping there won't be any more war."
Recent weeks indicate that Chechen separatists are still fighting. Earlier this month, some 30 people were reported killed in a night of attacks on police stations and patrols in Grozny, the capital.
In addition, the elections were shadowed by mounting suspicions that Chechen terrorists brought down two Russian airliners that crashed nearly simultaneously on Tuesday. Officials say traces of explosives were found in the wreckage of both planes and that they are investigating two Chechen women who were among the passengers -- one aboard each plane.
The region's top police official, Major General Alu Alkhanov, is the unquestioned favorite among the seven candidates for president, and the Kremlin has made clear its support for him. When Russian President Vladimir Putin made a surprise visit to Kadyrov's grave last week, state television showed Alkhanov beside him.
Alkhanov appears frequently on television newscasts -- while the other candidates are seen rarely, if ever -- and officials in the Moscow-backed Chechen government barred Alkhanov's only serious challenger from running.
"He's a man of integrity ... I see him on television," Yarnasa said.
The lack of any real opposition to Alkhanov has led human rights groups and many Chechens to assume the election result is a foregone conclusion, as was last year's election of Kadyrov.
The ITAR-Tass news agency cited election officials as saying more than 10 percent of the eligible voters turned out in the first two hours of voting. However, at the polling station in Oiskhara, officials said only about 25 people had shown up to cast ballots in the first two hours.
At the polling station, guards waved metal detectors over each prospective voter and men of uncertain affiliation in camouflage outfits watched from the second floor.
Chechnya's more than 1 million residents live in a largely dysfunctional region. Nearly three-quarters of the population are without work. Electricity and telephone service are almost nonexistent. Tens of thousands of people have fled, mostly to neighboring Ingushetia. Hundreds have disappeared in kidnappings blamed on separatist fighters, Russian forces and allied paramilitaries.
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