Over 100 people are confirmed dead, with many more wounded, after terrorists opened fire on a concert hall in Moscow. Reports of the event days later are still inconsistent, with up to 11 suspects named and 4 suspects in custody.
While the Islamic State claims responsibility, and Russia acknowledges they appear behind the attack, Putin is still claiming that the CIA helped train the perpetrators of the crime. He also claimed the captured terrorists were trying to escape to Ukraine. The U.S. warned its citizens and Russia that an attack on a large crowd was immanent in Moscow. That warning came two weeks before the attack.
Excerpt from humanevents.com
Suspected gunmen accused of committing a terrorist attack at a concert hall in Moscow, Russia were seen frogmarched blindfolded into a building to be interrogated by the Russian Investigative Committee on Saturday.
Photographs showed the alleged suspects being taken out of vans and transported into the building by security.
The terrorist group Islamic State (IS) took credit for the attack on Friday that killed at least 137 people, and it is believed that the men were employed by ISIS-K, one of its offshoots, per the Daily Mail.
At the scene of the massacre, which occurred at Crocus City Hall, officers reported finding more than 500 rounds of ammunition, 28 magazines, and four sets of combat ammunition. Two Kalashnikov assault rifles were also recovered.
Russian authorities said they arrested 11 suspects and released the names and photos of four suspects who are believed to be directly involved in the massacre, which is considered to be the deadliest terror attack in Russia in years, Fox News reports.
Four suspected terrorists were seen arriving in a white unmarked van at the concert hall around 8 pm in Krasnogorsk, which is just outside of Moscow.
Excerpt from resistthemainstream.com
In the early aftermath of a devastating attack on a concert hall in the Moscow Oblast, Russia has called on the United States to share any relevant information it possesses, especially concerning Ukraine’s involvement, or lack thereof, in the attack.
Initial reports from RIA Novosti, a state news outlet, indicated that several assailants entered the concert hall and commenced firing with automatic weapons. Following this, it was reported that an explosive device, possibly a grenade or incendiary bomb, was detonated, igniting a blaze within the hall.
White House spokesperson John Kirby earlier stated there was “no indication at this time that Ukraine, Ukrainians were involved.”
Responding to these comments, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova questioned the basis on which the United States could assert Ukraine’s innocence amid such a tragedy.
“The White House said it sees no signs that Ukraine or Ukrainians are involved in the terrorist attack in Moscow,” Zakharova remarked. “On what basis do officials in Washington draw any conclusions in the midst of a tragedy about someone’s innocence?”
Excerpt from humanevents.com
ISIS has claimed responsibility for the attack on Crocus City Hall in Moscow, Russia.
Their statement reportedly read: “A security source told Amaq Agency: Islamic State fighters attacked a large gathering of Christians in the city of Krasnogorsk on the outskirts of the Russian capital, Moscow, killing and wounding hundreds and causing great destruction to the place before they withdrew to their bases safely.”
Excerpt from abcnews.go.com
MOSCOW — Russian authorities arrested the four men suspected of carrying out the attack on a suburban Moscow concert hall that killed at least 133 people, President Vladimir Putin said Saturday during an address to the nation. He claimed they were captured while fleeing to Ukraine.
Kyiv strongly denied any involvement in Friday’s attack on the Crocus City Hall music venue in Krasnogorsk and the Islamic State’s Afghanistan affiliate claimed responsibility.
Putin didn’t mention IS in his speech, and Kyiv accused him and other Russian politicians of falsely linking Ukraine to the assault in order to stoke fervor in Russia’s war in Ukraine, which recently entered its third year.
U.S. intelligence officials confirmed the claim by IS’s Afghanistan affiliate that it was responsible for the attack, a U.S. official told The Associated Press. U.S. intelligence agencies gathered information in recent weeks that the IS branch was planning an attack in Moscow, and U.S. officials privately shared the intelligence with Russian officials earlier this month, the U.S. official said. The official was briefed on the matter but was not authorized to publicly discuss the intelligence information and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.
Putin said authorities have detained a total of 11 people in the attack, which also injured more than 100 concertgoers and left the venue on Moscow’s western rim a smoldering ruin. He called it “a bloody, barbaric terrorist act” and said Russian authorities captured the four suspected gunmen as they were trying to escape to Ukraine through a “window” prepared for them on the Ukrainian side of the border.
Excerpt from timesofindia.indiatimes.com
LONDON: A claim of responsibility by Islamic State for a massacre of Russian concertgoers near Moscow appears to be plausible and fits with a pattern of previous marauding attacks by Islamist militants, security analysts said on Saturday.
One leading expert said, however, it was unusual and striking that the assailants had formed and executed an escape plan instead of pursuing their rampage to the point of being gunned down.
Islamic State, also known as IS or ISIS, issued statements claiming responsibility for Friday evening’s attack in which Russian investigators said 133 people were killed, and published a photograph of the alleged gunmen.
Russia has not said who it believes was behind the mass shooting, but has stated – without providing evidence – that the perpetrators had contacts in Ukraine. It said the gunmen fled by car and were captured hours later near the Ukrainian border. Ukraine, defending against Russia’s invasion since 2022, has emphatically denied any involvement.
Adam Dolnik, a Czech security expert who has studied past Islamist attacks in India, Kenya, Russia and elsewhere, said the Islamic State claim appeared credible, although “that will not stop the Russians from leveraging this for their foreign policy agenda vis-a-vis Ukraine and the West”.
Dolnik said in a telephone interview that attacks by marauding gunmen were a typical modus operandi in recent years for IS and al Qaeda.
He noted Islamic State has a record of previous attacks against Russia, including the bombing of a 2015 flight from the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh to St Petersburg and a 2022 attack on the Russian embassy in Kabul. Earlier this month, Russia’s FSB said it foiled an attack on a Moscow synagogue by ISIS-K, an affiliate of the group.
“If you line up all these things together, then I think it’s completely conceivable that this would be an IS attack,” he said.
Excerpt from www.thesun.co.uk
ISIS released a grotesque video of their attack on a Moscow concert hall where 133 people, including children, were slaughtered.
Terrorists stormed the building, unleashing hellfire with machine guns and sparking a blaze to stop survivors from getting out alive.
At least four gunmen from the notorious terror group swarmed the Crocus City Hall venue on the outskirts of Moscow during a rock show by the band Picnic.
Russia said the four suspected shooters had been arrested along with at least seven others in connection with its deadliest terrorist attack in 20 years.
In the hours since the massacre, ISIS has released a twisted video from inside the concert hall.
The Sun has chosen not to publish the disturbing footage.
It shows at least four men, with machine guns and knives, walking past bodies on the floor.
One goes into the concert hall arena and opening fire, as people lie dead on the floor around him.
Another member of the group is seen stabbing someone.
Excerpt from www.themoscowtimes.com
President Vladimir Putin on Monday night said for the first time that “radical Islamists” were behind Friday’s attack on a concert hall outside Moscow, but otherwise doubled down on his previous claim that Ukraine may have somehow been involved and suggested that Washington was allegedly trying to cover it up.
Eleven people were detained on Saturday in connection with the previous night’s attack, which saw camouflaged gunmen storm into the popular music venue Crocus City Hall, open fire on concert-goers and set the building ablaze, killing at least 139 people and wounding 182 others
“We know that the crime was committed by radical Islamists, whose ideology the Islamic world has itself been fighting for centuries,” Putin said in a televised meeting with top government officials.
“We also see that the United States by various means is trying to convince its satellites, as well as other countries, that according to their intelligence information, there was allegedly no trace of Kyiv’s [involvement] in the Moscow terrorist attack,” he continued.
“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,” Putin said, referring to Ukraine as a “neo-Nazi regime.”