National mourning was observed on Sunday March 24 in Russia, two days after the attack claimed by the Islamic State which left at least 137 dead in a concert hall in Krasnogorsk, a suburb of Moscow. Vladimir Putin, who spoke on Saturday, almost 24 hours after the events, did not make a new statement but lit a candle in the chapel of his residence in Nono-Ogarievo.
Among the 137 killed are three children, specifies the Investigative Committee in its latest report, communicated on Sunday, while research continues in the rubble of Crocus City Hall. Health authorities also report 180 injured.
The Investigative Committee released a video on Sunday showing masked agents in fatigues bringing the four suspected perpetrators of the attack, arrested the day before, to the headquarters of the body. He must request their detention “soon”. No information was provided on the fate of seven other people whose arrest was announced on Saturday and whose role was not specified. The police also announced the discovery at the scene of the attack of 500 cartridges, two Kalashnikov assault rifles and 28 magazines which belonged, according to them, “to the attackers”.
“No Ukrainian involvement” for Washington
If the Islamic State (IS) organization claimed responsibility for the attack on Friday evening, the Russian authorities have still not mentioned the responsibility of the jihadist movement, emphasizing the role they attribute to Ukraine.
Vladimir Putin assured Saturday that “the four direct perpetrators” of the attack had been arrested while they “tried to flee and headed towards Ukraine”, where “a passage” had, according to him, been provided for them to so that they can cross it.
This thesis is rejected by Washington, for whom IS bears “sole responsibility for this attack”. “There is no Ukrainian involvement,” said White House National Security Council spokeswoman Adrienne Watson. British Finance Minister Jeremy Hunt also cast doubt on Mr. Putin’s version, saying he had “very little confidence” in the word of the Russian authorities.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused his Russian counterpart of wanting to “shift the blame” onto his country and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said he hoped on Saturday that the attack would not be “a pretext” for an “escalation”. of violence” in Ukraine.
A few days before the attack, Mr. Putin had described American warnings about the risk of an attack in Russia as “provocation.”
According to Russian media and MP Alexandre Khinstein, some of the alleged perpetrators are from Tajikistan, a country facing IS attacks and neighboring Afghanistan. “We emphasize that the Tajik side has not received confirmation from the Russian authorities regarding the false information currently circulating on the involvement of Tajik citizens,” specifies the country’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, however, in a press release released on Saturday March 23 in the morning on Telegram. Tajik President Emomali Rakhmon and his Russian counterpart spoke on Sunday and decided to “intensify” their anti-terrorism cooperation.
The attack on Crocus City Hall is the deadliest attack committed in Russia in twenty years. The Islamic State organization, which Russia is fighting in Syria and which is active in the Russian Caucasus, had already committed smaller attacks there since the end of the 2010s.
