MOSCA. Last March 8, based on a series of US intelligence reports, the American embassy in Moscow warned its fellow Americans that unspecified “extremists” had imminent plans to attack large gatherings in Moscow, including concerts. They were only wrong in saying “in the next 48 hours”. The embassies of seven other countries had subsequently complied with the US warning. But Putin, speaking after the elections to the FSB board, was blunt about these warnings, calling them “real blackmail and the intention to intimidate and destabilize our society.” According to CNN last night, the United States had warned Russia of the risk of attacks by ISIS-K, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. In the evening, a statement circulated by the ISIS Amaq agency about involvement in the terrorist attack in Moscow, but it is published on an obsolete template of the group and could be false, notes the Russian nationalist channel Rybar. At the same time, a message from alleged militants of the ISIS cell “Vilayat Caucasus” about a terrorist attack in Moscow is circulating online. But even here, its authenticity cannot be confirmed.
During the night, according to the Shot telegram channel, a white Renault Symbol, in which the terrorists fled after the attack, was stopped in Bryansk. There would be 4 citizens of Tajikistan, two of whom would have been arrested, and two who had fled, write Baza and Shot. Their photos were released.
The only certain fact for now is that the shooting took place: on the evening of Friday 22 March, a few days later than the CIA alarms. Everything was very violent. Four (but some say 5) armed men in camouflage broke into the Crocus City Hall concert hall in the capital at 8pm Moscow time. Crocus City Hall is the largest concert hall in Moscow, located on the western outskirts of the city. The hall can accommodate 6,200 people. According to concert agencies, all tickets for the March 22 concert had been sold. One of the attackers opened fire with a machine gun before the start of the concert of the group Picnic, the channels reported The base, Mash e Beware of News. Dozens of injuries and many deaths were reported from the beginning. Second Moscow Timesthere were immediately at least 12 dead, and 50 injured. But the Telegram channel 112 at 8pm Italian time he was already talking about 40 dead and 100 injured: a figure later confirmed by the FSB, the Russian internal secret services. The toll is now at least 80 dead and 146 injured. In the evening, second Msk1, the four attackers had managed to escape. They were armed with AKM attack rifles. At least two of the attackers had backpacks with them, probably containing Molotov cocktails. According to Baza, the unknown man who opened fire also set off some firecrackers. A fire had broken out in the building.
Mash published a video in which the three can be seen clearly. There were people left in the building, at least 100, who risked dying from the fire. The evacuation was made extremely problematic by the tightness of the roof and the structure. The channel also reports an explosion. In a video on Novaya Gazeta we see the attackers – at least four – advancing and shooting in cold blood at some people who are trying to take shelter in a corner just outside the entrance, in a shopping centre, and then enter.
Shooting in a concert hall in Moscow, three men in camouflage opened fire, dozens of victims dead and injured
One of the eyewitnesses told Mash that there were at least five attackers, all bearded. They behaved, the witness explained, like prepared and trained militants. When entering the building, the guards and people standing at the doors were killed. Then the main entrance was blocked.
The Insider he has no hesitation in speaking of a “terrorist attack”. The musicians were not injured in the shooting, law enforcement officials said. The governor of the Moscow region Vorobiev went to the site of the terrorist attack. Several chilling videos later surfaced, eyewitnesses showing strangers shooting people. Telegram stopped working regularly in Russia in the evening, and therefore photos and videos were difficult to upload from the Moscow area. The echo of the Dubrovka attack is becoming louder, but it is only a suggestion, because then there was the Chechen guerrilla war going crazy, now the Chechens are firmly in the hands of Putin’s regime.
Terrorist attack in Moscow, flames rise from the concert hall
The Russian Special Rapid Reaction Teams (SOBR) and the Moscow Police Mobile Special Units (OMON) were sent to the scene of the massacre. But the contours of an attack, in Putin’s regime, can never be clear, much less in a few hours. The spokesperson for the US National Security Council at the White House, John Kirby, described the images of the incident as “horrific”, and assured that “our thoughts are with the victims”. Washington, however, is convinced that Ukraine had nothing to do with it (Kirby says that “there are no indications that Ukraine or Ukrainians were involved”). The Russian Foreign Ministry calls on the entire international community to condemn the “terrorist attack”. The Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani expressed his “condemnation of every form of terrorism and closeness towards the families of the victims”.
Moscow, attack on the concert hall: the survivors escape on the bridge
However, things in Putin’s Russia are always controversial: even more so in the long dark history of attacks during Putinism (from apartment bombs to Dubrovka and Beslan). The Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine claims that the shooting in Moscow «is a deliberate provocation by the Putin regime», as the spokesman for Ukrainian military intelligence Andriy Yusov explains: «It is a provocation deliberate by Putin’s special services, against which the international community had warned. The Kremlin tyrant began his career with this and wants to end it with the same crimes against his own citizens.”
An idea that also circulates in the world of Russian independent investigative journalists. Roman Dobrokhtov, the director of The Insider, hypothesizes: «And here is the terrorist attack that all Western intelligence agencies had warned about (but the Russian ones did not warn). If “Ukrainians” appear who “take responsibility”, it means that Putin is 100% preparing a pretext for general mobilization».