Because skiing is “un-Islamic.”

(Telegraph) — At least four tourists from Moscow have been killed by militants in Russia’s North Caucasus region on their way to a ski resort.

“Two people in masks armed with automatic guns in a foreign-made car forced the minibus onto the hard shoulder, asked about passengers, then opened fire on the vehicle and fled from the scene,” the Investigative Committee said in a statement.

All six people in the vehicle were from the Moscow region. Three died on the spot and two were taken to hospital, it said.

A message on Islamist website Islamdin.com, hosted by the militant group Caucasus Emirate, said the tourists were killed by “mujahideens” because they “came into the zone of war”.

The group was going skiing to the Elbrus mountain area when they were ambushed near the village Zayukovo, according to the NTV channel, adding that a fourth person died in hospital.

The Kremlin fought two wars against separatist rebels in Chechnya in the 1990s but the insurgency has now become more Islamist in tone and has spread to neighbouring regions.