MOSCOW, Sept 20 (Reuters) - A leading Muslim cleric was shot dead in his car in southern Russia on Sunday, a state investigator said, in an attack another religious leader blamed on Islamist militants.
Gunmen shot dead Ismail Bostanov, the second most senior Muslim cleric in Karachayevo-Cherkessia region, as his car arrived in the regional capital Cherkessk, investigator Vyacheslav Taranenko said.
Karachayevo-Cherkessia is one of the least violent of Russia’s mainly Muslim North Caucasus regions and has largely escaped a recent surge in violence in nearby Chechnya, Dagestan and Ingushetia.
The killing was likely carried out by adherents of the Wahhabi strain of Islam, whose influence Bostanov had tried to curb, another senior cleric in the region Ismail Berdiyev was quoted as saying by the Interfax news agency.
A police officer and two of his brothers were shot dead in a separate attack in Ingushetia on Sunday, Interfax reported, citing a police spokesman. (Writing by Conor Humphries; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
According to officials, a Muslim religious leader and two anti-terrorism officers were killed in the Ingushetia region of Russia on Sunday in two separate gun attacks.

Ingush Interior Ministry spokesman Madina Khadzhiyeva said that the officers were killed by gunfire while driving along a highway in the region at around noon on Sunday.

 a spokesperson said.

The RIA news agency reports that searches are ongoing to apprehend the attackers.

Meanwhile, the Karachayevo-Cherkessiya Interior Ministry reported that Ismail Bostanov, a leading Muslim cleric, was was gunned down on the same day, in a separate attack.

The Ministry said it believes the attack was carried out by adherents of Wahhabism, a fundamentalist branch of Islam, a group whose influence Bostanov had attempted to reduce.