MOSCOW, July 5: Two suicide bombers, both women, blew themselves up at a Moscow rock festival on Saturday, killing at least 18 people and injuring around 50 others, in a chilling reminder that the war in Chechnya rages on.

The bombers struck at a ticket booth after guards refused to let them into the popular day-long outdoor festival that had begun several hours earlier at Tushino airfield, in northwestern Moscow.

Russian Interior Minister Boris Gryzlov told journalists at the scene that 16 people and the two suicide bombers died in the attack.

Medical sources later told Russian news agencies that two more people had died in hospital, bringing the death toll, including the two bombers, to 20.

“Everybody thought it was fireworks,” said one young concertgoer interviewed by Rossiya television. He said he was standing just metres away from the entrance when the blast went off.

“And then I saw a girl lying there, dead.”

A passport belonging to a 20-year-old Chechen was found on one of the bombers, the interior minister said.

“Today the president signed a decree on elections in Chechnya, and one can think that these attacks are linked to this event,” Mr Gryzlov told journalists at the scene.

A medical source quoted by Interfax news agency said 46 people had been hospitalized, most with shrapnel wounds from the suicide belts. He warned that the death toll may still rise.

Earlier on Saturday, Russian President Vladimir Putin officially decreed presidential elections in Chechnya for Oct 5, following a March referendum in which Chechens controversially voted to confirm the republic’s place within the Russian Federation.

That vote prompted Mr Putin to declare that the nearly four-year-long war between Chechens and Russian troops had come to an end.

That declaration has been severely questioned after a series of suicide attacks in Chechnya over the past few months that have killed some 100 people.

The attack at the concert, attended by some 40,000 people, was the most brazen since 41 attackers stormed a Moscow theatre in October.—AFP