Loud blast near seized theatre: report
There are reports of a loud blast near a theatre in Moscow where an audience is being held hostage by Chechan rebels.
Around 40 Chechen rebels seized the theatre last night, threatening to shoot the audience and blow up the building if Russian security forces intervened.
Moscow police say around 100 women and children have been released. About 500 people are still being held.
A number of British tourists are believed to be in the audience.
A UK Foreign Office spokesman said: "We have got evidence that there were three, or perhaps more, Britons in the theatre at the time the siege began."
Reports from the Russian capital said automatic gunfire was heard sporadically during the hostage-taking.
Frantic hostages inside the theatre, which can hold more than 1,110 people, called their families and TV stations on mobile phones. Outside, relatives waited in freezing rain for news of their loved ones.
"The terrorists are demanding one thing - the end to the war in Chechnya," Moscow police spokesman Valery Gribakin said.
One Russian TV news channel quoted theatre-goers saying the attackers said they had mines strapped to their bodies.
According to other Russian television and news agency reports, armed men and women, wearing camouflage, arrived in Jeeps just as the second act was about to begin.
When police and security forces surrounded the theatre, the attackers opened fire and threw a grenade.
