Yesterday morning Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov refused to comment on the authorship of Friday’s terrorist attack, which left 137 dead and 153 injured at the Crocus City auditorium in Krasnagorsk, on the outskirts of Moscow, and said that “the investigation is ongoing” and “so far, no version has been presented at all”, which triggered conspiracy theories in the Russian media to point to the complicity of not only Ukraine, but ‘ The West. With the ground prepared, President Vladimir Putin was finally able to allude at night to the Islamic State – which had claimed responsibility for the massacre – but without mentioning it.
“How is it that radical Islamists, who take sides as orthodox Muslims, who profess what is known as pure Islam, proceed to commit horrific barbarities and crimes in the holy month for Muslims, Ramadan?” he asked, as reported the Efe agency. Then, it was again questioned whether, “really, Islamic radical and terrorist organizations are interested in launching attacks against Russia, which today advocates a just solution to the acute conflict in the Middle East”. Putin answered himself: “This atrocity may be just one link in a whole series of attempts by those who have been at war with our country since 2014 by means of the neo-Nazi regime in Kyiv.”
Four suspected gunmen captured were brought before the judge on Sunday with signs of having been beaten or tortured. Two of them pleaded guilty. A third, in a wheelchair and with a catheter, was barely conscious. All four are originally from Tajikistan. This is Dalerdjon Mirzoiev, 32 years old and father of four; Xamsidin Fariduni, 25, who would have declared that he acted for money (about 5,000 euros); Saidakrami Ratxabalizdoda, 30, who had part of his ear cut off during an interrogation, according to a video posted on Telegram. Finally, 19-year-old Muhamadsobir Faizov, the one prostrated in the chair, reportedly lost an eye.
Dmitri Peskov, in his morning statement, did not mention seven other detainees, of whom there was no news. Three more were added yesterday, two brothers and their father – Aminxon, Dilovar and Isroil Islomov -, who were sentenced to two months in preventive detention. Dilovar is said to have recently sold Xamsidin Fariduni the Renault Symbol used by the suspects. The brothers had gone to the police themselves when they learned that the vehicle was involved, according to the Mediazona portal.
Putin said on television on Saturday that the four suspects were heading by car to Ukraine, where “a hole had been opened for them to cross the border”, which confirmed the version given by the FSB (former KGB). “It is necessary to answer the question of why (…) they tried to flee precisely to Ukraine”, he insisted yesterday.
It was the message of vindication of the Islamic State-Khorassan that led to outline a first version of what happened, pointed out Novaya Gazeta Europa: “The attack was no longer the work of Ukraine alone, but be orchestrated with the help of Western powers and made it look like an Islamist terrorist attack”. Margarita Simonian, director of the RT channel, had already been quick to say that “it is clear why the media in the United States shouted in unison that it was ISIS” (IS) and that “the authors they were selected in such a way that they could convince the stupid world community that it was ISIS”.
The spokeswoman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova, went further, and insisted to Komsomólskaia Pravda on the authorship of Western services, according to the old Russian theory that IS was a creation of the United States. The same medium interviewed Andrei Klintsevich, director of the Center for the Study of Political and Military Conflicts, who said that in that concert “the main role is for the British”, because “influencing the enemy through terrorism is a of its elements”. Klintsevich alluded to the fact that one of the gunmen appeared on a security camera on March 8. “And the Americans warned us precisely on the 7th”, he said.
The warning from Washington to Moscow would have been both private and public, and based on the capture of conversations between members of IS-Khorassan. But Putin dismissed it as a Western attempt to “intimidate and destabilize”. According to the Russian Telegram channel VCHK-OGPU, the terrorists initially wanted to attack during a concert on March 9, but a warning from the US Embassy changed the plans. Russian intelligence services were never able to determine who or where the threat came from.”
The acts of mourning and tribute to the victims continued yesterday, as well as the identification of corpses. 76 people, including 4 children, were hospitalized; 23 of them in serious condition, and 6, extremely serious. A certain climate of tension was also maintained. Since Saturday, several bomb threats have been registered in Moscow, Saint Petersburg, Ufa, Volgograd, Briansk or the Sverlovsk region. Most of them affected shopping centers (three, yesterday in Moscow), but also a hospital in the capital that housed people injured in the terrorist attack, from which 700 people had to be evacuated yesterday. On Saturday, police confiscated a car with weapons and bulletproof vests in front of a shopping center in Vladivostok, according to a local media outlet.
