Russian officials on Friday said they had arrested three people plotting an attack in the country’s south, a week after the assault on a Moscow concert hall killed at least 144 people.
The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) said it had “put an end to the terrorist activities of three nationals from a Central Asian country,” Russian news agencies reported.
The three suspects had been “planning to commit a terrorist act by blowing up a device in a public place in the Stavropol region,” it added.
Photo: Reuters
Russian television stations showed images of several men pinned to the ground by FSB agents.
The ingredients for an improvised explosive device and chemical substances had been found at the home of one of the suspects, the RIA Novosti news agency said.
The Stavropol region sits in the North Caucasus region of southern Russia, bordering Dagestan and Chechnya among others.
The announcement came a week after the massacre at the Crocus City concert hall on the outskirts of Moscow, which claimed at least 144 lives.
Nine people have been detained by Tajikistan’s state security service over suspected contact with the perpetrators, RIA Novosti said.
An affiliate of the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack, the deadliest on Russian soil in years.
However, the Kremlin has insisted that Ukraine and the West had a role, something Kyiv has vehemently denied.
Citing an unnamed source in Tajikistan’s security services, RIA Novosti said that those detained in the Central Asian country were residents of the Vakhdat district that lies east of the Tajik capital, Dushanbe.
Those being detained are suspected of having connections with Islamic State, the report said, adding that Russian security forces were also involved in the operation to detain them.
In Russia, a total of nine suspects have faced court so far and were remanded in pretrial detention. The latest hearing took place on Friday, with a judge in the Basmanny District Court ruling that suspect Lutfulloi Nazrimad should be held in custody until at least May 22.
Russian independent news site Mediazona cited Nazrimad as saying in court that he was born in Tajikistan.
Russian officials previously said that 11 suspects had been arrested, including four who allegedly carried out the attack.
Those four, identified as Tajik nationals, appeared in a Moscow court on Sunday last week on terrorism charges and showed signs of severe beatings. One appeared to be barely conscious during the hearing.
Russia’s Investigative Committee said on Thursday it had detained another suspect in relation to the raid on Crocus City Hall, on suspicion of being involved in financing the attack.
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