ISLAMIC STATE CLAIMS RESPONSIBILITY
The Islamic State group claimed responsibility on Friday, saying its fighters attacked “a large gathering” on Moscow’s outskirts and “retreated to their bases safely”.
The Kremlin said 11 people, including the four assailants, had been arrested. Russia’s FSB security service said some of the perpetrators had fled towards the Russia-Ukraine border, adding that the assailants had “appropriate contacts” in the country.
Russian investigators showed pictures from inside the hall showing an automatic weapon, vests with multiple spare magazines and bags of spent bullet casings that had been collected from the scene.
A grainy picture was published by some Russian media of two of the alleged attackers in a white car.
Russian lawmaker Alexander Khinshtein, a former journalist, said that the white Renault used by the suspects was found in a village in the Bryansk region, about 340km southwest of Moscow.
“One terrorist was detained on the spot, the rest fled into the forest,” Khinshtein said.
He said a pistol, a Kalashnikov magazine and passports of Tajik citizens were found in the car. Reuters was unable to verify that information.
Ukraine meanwhile accused the Kremlin and its services of orchestrating the attack and justifying an escalation in the war.
The Ukrainian foreign ministry said accusations against the country were “a planned provocation by the Kremlin to further fuel anti-Ukrainian hysteria in Russian society”.
Former president Dmitry Medvedev said Moscow would “destroy” Ukrainian leaders if they were found to be involved.
WHY DID ISLAMIC STATE ATTACK MOSCOW?
Islamic State’s Afghan branch, known as Islamic State Khorasan (ISIS-K), is one of the most active regional affiliates of the militant group that once sought control over swathes of Iraq and Syria.
It has a history of attacks, including against mosques, inside and outside Afghanistan.
Experts said the group has opposed Russian President Vladimir Putin in recent years.
Putin changed the course of the Syrian civil war by intervening in 2015, supporting President Bashar al-Assad against the opposition and Islamic State.
“ISIS-K has been fixated on Russia for the past two years, frequently criticising Putin in its propaganda,” said Colin Clarke of Soufan Center, a Washington-based research group.
Michael Kugelman of the Washington-based Wilson Center said that ISIS-K “sees Russia as being complicit in activities that regularly oppress Muslims”.
He added that the group also counts as members a number of Central Asian militants with their own grievances against Moscow.
WARNINGS AND DARK HISTORY OF RADICAL ATTACKS
The attack on Crocus City Hall, about 20km from the Kremlin, comes just two weeks after the US embassy in Russia warned about the risk of “extremists” targeting mass gatherings in Moscow, including concerts.
“If the United States had reliable information on this, it should have immediately transmitted it,” said Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, calling Friday’s attack a “monstrous crime”.
Hours before the embassy warning, the Federal Security Service (FSB) said it had foiled an attack on a Moscow synagogue by ISIS-K, which seeks a caliphate across Afghanistan, Pakistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Iran.
“We did warn the Russians appropriately,” a US officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Russian authorities announced on Mar 3 that six suspected Islamic State fighters had been killed in an operation in Ingushetia, a small Muslim-majority republic in the Caucasus region.
In September 2022, ISIS-K militants claimed responsibility for a deadly suicide bombing at the Russian embassy in Kabul.
Russia has been the target of past attacks by militants, but also mass killings with no clear political link.
In 2002, Chechen separatist fighters took 912 people hostage in a Moscow theatre, the Dubrovka, demanding the withdrawal of Russian troops from the Caucasus republic.
Special forces attacked the theatre to end the hostage-taking and 130 people were killed, nearly all suffocated by a gas used by security forces to knock out the gunmen.
