The United States confirmed the information that ISIS was behind Friday’s terrorist attack at a concert hall outside Moscow that killed at least 60 people and injured over 140 others, The New York Times reported, quoting American officials.
The Russian publication in exile, Meduza, recalls that Vladimir Putin recently shrugged off warnings from American diplomats about imminent terrorist threats targeting large gatherings in Moscow. The Russian president called the warnings “total blackmail” by the West “designed to intimidate and destabilize (Russian) society”.
Meanwhile, the Russian channel NTV aired what appeared to be a deepfake video showing Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s Security and Defense Council, confirming the involvement of his country in the attack.
Moreover, Dmitry Medvedev, deputy head of Russia’s Security Council, declared that if Ukraine’s involvement is confirmed “all of (the attackers) must be tracked down and exterminated mercilessly as terrorists. Including the state officials who committed such atrocity”.
At the same time, the Free Russia Forum suggested that statements voiced in recent days by senior Russian officials, including Putin himself, indicate an intention to bolster armed forces and intensify fighting in Ukraine. The recent terror attack, it is suggested, could be a false flag operation to stoke pro-war sentiments against Ukraine.
“Remember how the Putin regime and its special services prepared the ground for the second Chechen war”, the dissident group concluded.
From Kyiv, Mykhailo Podolyak, adviser to the President Zelenskyy, declared that Ukraine “has nothing to do with the Crocus shootings and explosions. This makes no sense. First, Ukraine has been at war with the Russian military for more than two years. And in this war everything will be decided only on the battlefield. Only by force of arms and skilled military decisions. Terrorist attacks do not solve any problems. Second, Ukraine has never resorted to terrorist methods. It is completely meaningless. Not in Russia, which is using terrorist attacks in the ongoing war against Ukraine, and some time ago attacked its own citizens to then initiate ‘counter-terrorist actions’ against protesting ethnic groups. It is enough to recall the events at the Kashirskoye Shosse and Volgodonsk. And thirdly, long before the Crocus events, we heard public warnings from foreign embassies in Moscow about the possibility of such bloody excesses. In conclusion: there is not the slightest doubt that the events in the Moscow area will contribute to a sharp increase in military propaganda, to the acceleration of militarization, to the expansion of mobilization and, ultimately, to the amplification of war. And they will also serve to justify the exemplary bombings carried out as part of Russia’s genocide against Ukraine”, concluded Mykhailo Podolyak.
