Attack on Moscow: Kremlin refuses to comment on ISIS accusation in attack and tries to implicate Ukraine

The Kremlin He refused to comment on the terrorist group’s claims on Monday ISIS-K of the attack during a concert in Moscow, in which 137 people died, while investigations are ongoing.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his security service, the FSB, did not mention the group’s involvement this weekend They targeted the Ukrainian trackdenied by Kiev and Western governments.

At least 137 people died in Friday’s attack by a group of armed men on a concert at the complex. Croco Town Hallon the outskirts of Moscow, in the bloodiest attack on European soil claimed by ISIS.

“The investigation is ongoing and the presidential administration would be wrong to comment on the development of the investigation. we won’t“Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists on Monday.

The ISIS group, which Russia fights in Syria and which is active in the Russian Caucasus, claimed responsibility for the attack, but the Russian authorities specified that The alleged killers were trying to flee to Ukrainian territory after the attack.

Kiev, faced with the Russian offensive for more than two yearshe steadfastly denied any involvement in the attack. The United States also rejected the Russian president’s version.

The image of the hard man is crushed

The Moscow-area concert hall attack, which killed hundreds of people, dealt a blow to President Vladimir Putin’s image as a tough guy capable of defending Russia against all threats. This came less than a week after a Kremlin-orchestrated election victory gave him another six years in power.

Putin quickly searched use the attack to serve their political objectives. In a television appearance on Saturday, hours after the attack, Putin claimed a link between the attackers and Ukraine, saying the attackers had planned to flee there. He did not mention ISIS, which claimed responsibility, nor Kiev’s refusal of involvement.

Putin’s statement signaled an apparent intention to escalate the war and strengthen political repression in the country.

Kremlin critics have attacked Putin for focusing Russia’s massive police and security services on cracking down on political opponents, human rights groups and LGBTQ+ activists. leaving the country unprotected from the threats of armed extremists.

If Putin continues to directly blame Ukraine for the attackthey will probably use it as justification for even more ferocious attacks. Hours before Friday’s bloodshed, the Russian military launched a bombardment of Ukraine’s energy system, crippling its largest hydroelectric power plant and leaving more than 1 million people without electricity. More attacks followed over the weekend.

Searching through the rubble

Investigators were at the scene of the attack They continued searching through the rubble of the roomdestroyed by a fire set by the attackers.

The number of injured was 182, of which On Monday, 97 people were still hospitalizedaccording to the authorities.

The Kremlin said this on Monday Putin will not go to the site of the attack.

Peskov, however, did not want to comment. allegations of torture against detained suspects, this emerged after videos and images were published on social media in which three of the four arrested appear with bloodied faces.

Another video, circulated on the Internet and the veracity of which could not be confirmed, shows how an off-camera person cuts off the ear of one of the suspects in the attack.

On Sunday evening, when the suspects appeared in court, one of them had a white bandage over one ear and another arrived in a wheelchair with his eyes closed. It looked like one was missing an eye.

One of the Russian opposition figures in exile, Leonid Volkov, denounced the attempt of the Russian security services to “divert attention from (his) impotence and (his) failure” by showing these videos.

Authorities said they arrested a total of 11 people, including these four alleged attackers. But the profile of the other prisoners is not yet defined.

Death penalty for terrorists

The four individuals were placed in provisional detention on Sunday night, until May 22, pending their trial, the date of which has not yet been decided. Accused of “terrorism”, They risk life imprisonment.

Senior officials from Putin’s entourage have underlined this in the last few hours the moratorium on the death penalty is lifted for the “terrorists”.

The attack, which occurred a few days after Putin’s re-election and amid promises of security to the population after the intensification of Ukrainian attacks on Russian soil, It represents a severe setback for the president.

The attack recalls other terrorist acts that occurred during Putin’s first years in power, against the backdrop of the war in Chechnya: the taking of hostages in the Moscow theater of Dubrovka in 2002 and the Tragedy in Beslan school two years after.

The fight against terrorism “needs full international cooperation,” Peskov said Monday, but this collaboration “does not exist”.

French President Emmanuel Macron assured that he had proposed greater cooperation to Russia on the issue, but asked not to “exploit” Moscow’s attack. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk also called for it not to be used “as a pretext for an escalation of violence and aggression”.