Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday for the first time accused “radical Islamists” of carrying out last week’s attack on a concert hall outside Moscow, but continued to strongly suggest that Ukraine was still involved despite strong denials from Kyiv and Washington.
On Friday, camouflaged gunmen stormed into the Crocus City Hall theater and opened fire on concert-goers, killing at least 137 people and injuring scores more in one of the worst terror attacks of Mr. Putin‘s 25-year reign.
The Kremlin at first suggested Ukraine was behind the attack, in retaliation for Russia‘s more than two-year invasion of the country. But Russian officials presented no evidence of a link to Ukraine.
“We know that the crime was committed by the hands of radical Islamists, whose ideology the Islamic world itself has been fighting for centuries,” Mr. Putin said Monday in a televised meeting with government officials.
The four men charged with the attack have been identified by authorities as citizens of Tajikistan, the former Soviet republic that sends thousands of migrants to Russia each year in search of economic opportunities.
Mr. Putin implied that the concert hall slaughter may be “just a link in a whole series of attempts” against Russia orchestrated by Ukraine, which he referred to as the “neo-Nazi Kyiv regime,” according to the Agence France-Presse news agency.
“It is necessary to answer the question, ‘Why, after committing the crime, did the terrorists try to go to Ukraine? Who was waiting for them there?’” Mr. Putin asked, according to AFP.
Officials in Ukraine said they had no involvement in Friday’s terror attack, a position that the U.S. has supported. Blaming others is a common tactic used by Mr. Putin and his supporters, Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskyy said over the weekend.
“They don’t care what’s happening inside their own country. This absolutely miserable Putin, instead of attending to his own citizens of Russia and addressing them, remained silent for a day — thinking about how to link this with Ukraine,” Mr. Zelenskyy said. “They have come to Ukraine, burned our cities, and tried to blame Ukraine. They torture and rape people and accused them. Everything is absolutely predictable.”
Washington said it appears the Afghan branch of the Islamic State terror army known as ISIS-K carried out the brazen assault on the Moscow theater. Officials with ISIS publicly confirmed their responsibility, releasing video clips that showed the assailants spraying victims with gunfire before setting the concert hall ablaze.
U.S. intelligence officials even tried to alert Russian officials that there was evidence such an attack might be coming, a warning that Mr. Putin dismissed last week.
ISIS, which fought Russian forces that intervened in the Syrian civil war, has long targeted the country. The ISIS-K’s Aamaq news agency, said the group had carried out an attack in Krasnogorsk, the suburb of Moscow where the concert hall is located.
The group, which operates mainly in Syria and Iraq but also in Afghanistan and Africa, has claimed responsibility for several attacks in Russia‘s volatile Caucasus and other regions in past years. It recruited fighters from Russia and other parts of the former Soviet Union, the Associated Press reported
• This story is based in part on wire service reports.