There’s quite a bit of interesting info here ...
A man showed up at the Russian Embassy in Tbilisi a day before the Moscow metro blast and warned that Chechen rebels planned to carry out a "huge" terrorist attack in the capital on Friday, Georgia’s state security minister said Monday. The revelation came as investigators said Friday’s explosion bore the trademarks of a train suicide bombing in Stavropol last year and Moscow observed a day of mourning.
| "Putin knew! People blew!" |
Georgian Security Minister Valery Khaburdzania said the man was recruited by authorities in the breakaway region of Abkhazia who knew of the bombing in advance and plotted to place the blame for the attack on Georgia. He said the man, Nazir Aidabolov, a Russian citizen from the republic of Kabardino-Balkaria, was told to go to the Pankisi Gorge and collect the names of several Chechens there that he could later give to Federal Security Service officials at the Russian Embassy. This would have created "the impression that the terrorist acts had been planned specifically in the Pankisi Gorge," Khaburdzania told reporters in Tbilisi. He said Aidabolov went to the embassy and warned an FSB officer there that Chechens were planning a major attack for Friday. Abkhaz officials denied Khaburdzania’s allegations Monday.
Aidabolov also warned the FSB officer that a second attack would be carried out at an outdoor market in the southern Stavropol region two or three days later, Khaburdzania said. Stavropol authorities ordered all regional markets closed for three days after the Moscow bombing for sanitary inspections. The FSB has detained Aidabolov for questioning, Ekho Moskvy radio reported. FSB officials could not be reached for comment late Monday. But earlier in the day, the FSB, which is in charge of the metro bombing investigation, reiterated that Friday’s blast was most likely the work of a suicide bomber. "This terrorist act is identical to the one committed last year in Yessentuki," FSB deputy director Vyacheslav Ushakov told a gathering of State Duma deputies in the Moscow region. In December, a suicide bomber blew up a train near the Stavropol region town, killing 46 people. Ushakov did not elaborate on the similarities.
But sources close to the investigation said Monday that the explosive device used Friday had been packed with metal nuts and bolts - shrapnel meant to increase the force of the blast and used by Chechen suicide bombers in a series of attacks last year.
| Just like Hamas is fond of doing... |
The investigation is being headed by Alexander Zhdankov, the FSB’s pointman for combating terrorism and a former commander of the federal forces in Chechnya. Local media said his involvement might help investigators trace possible links between the explosion and Chechen rebels. As one of his first acts, Zhdankov ordered FSB departments in the North Caucasus region to search for possible accomplices in the Moscow bombing and focus on the families that lost relatives in the ongoing war with federal troops, Kommersant reported Monday. FSB sources said the blast might have been ordered by Arab warlord Abu Walid, who is thought to be responsible for distributing foreign financial aid among Chechen rebels, Moskovsky Komsomolets reported. While the main theory being investigated is that a suicide bomber detonated the explosives, the FSB is also looking into the possibility that a time bomb might have been left on the train and exploded when a passenger picked it up, Kommersant said. Investigators earlier established that the device detonated about 50 centimeters above the floor. A third theory is that the blast might have been accidental.
| I think we can discount that one... |
Although the official death toll has been placed at 39, reports from a morgue official familiar with the situation and in the local media put the number at between 50 to 120 people. Gazeta reported Monday that City Hall has a list of the actual number of people killed that is much higher than the official one, but the FSB has barred it from releasing the information. The FSB denied this. "We are ignoring this report. The main thing now is to conduct the investigation," an FSB spokesman said by telephone. The Moscow prosecutor’s office issued a vague statement saying that 39 is not the final figure but it was unlikely to change. Prosecutors said 34 bodies had been identified as of Monday - 18 men and 16 women. They said the dead included two Armenians and one Moldovan. The youngest was a teenager who was to turn 18 this month and the oldest was a man of 57. Pavel Ivanov of the Russian Forensic Medicine Center said the exact death toll could be established in four weeks, after experts study all the body fragments, RIA Novosti reported. The type of metro car that exploded can carry up to 200 passengers, Moscow metro spokeswoman Yelena Krylova said.
| I guess that's the upper limit number, then... |
Amid the accusations that rebels are behind Friday’s bombing, Chechens complained of a growing animosity Monday. Rudnik Dudayev, head of the Chechen Security Council said authorities have received hundreds of calls from Chechen students in other regions complaining of "cynical treatment" and "reproaches" by teachers. Chechnya President Akhmad Kadyrov condemned what he called "the instigation of ethnic enmity." Nationalities Minister Vladimir Zorin echoed his comments, saying, "International terrorism is no doubt Enemy No. 1 today, but it is no less dangerous to instigate anti-Caucasus and xenophobic sentiments in a great multinational country like Russia."
| What the hell did they expect? Chechens and their allies are targeting everybody else. If it was Veps or Kalmuks doing it, Veps or Kalmuks would be getting the cold shoulder. Perhaps the solution would be to turn in all the Chechen bad guys? Than everybody would be grateful. |
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