Foreigners linked to Crocus City Hall attack detained in Dagestan
3 Min Read
In the aftermath of the terrorist attack that struck Moscow's Crocus City Hall concert venue and left dozens of civilians dead, more arrests are being carried out.
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People light candles in memory of the victims of the terrorist attack in Moscow in Crimea, on Friday, March 22, 2024. (AP)
The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) announced on Monday that foreign nationals arrested in Dagestan were involved in financing and supplying terrorists in the Crocus City Hall attack on March 22.
On March 31, 2024, the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) in the Republic of Dagestan thwarted the operations of a terrorist group comprised of four foreign nationals. The group had been planning a terrorist attack in Kaspiysk targeting crowded areas. The individuals conducted surveillance of the location, constructed an improvised explosive device, and acquired automatic firearms. Following the planned attack, they intended to flee Russia.
"It was also established that the detained militants were directly involved in financing and providing terror means to the perpetrators of the terrorist act committed on March 22, 2024, in the Crocus City Hall concert hall in Moscow," the FSB said in a statement.
This comes shortly after three people were detained in a special operation in Russia's Dagestan Republic for plotting to commit terrorist crimes.
The suspects possessed automatic firearms, ammunition, and an improvised explosive device, as per the National Antiterrorism Committee (NAS).
On Sunday, the agency revealed that Russian special forces surrounded the suspected terrorists in several apartments in the cities of Makhachkala and Kaspisk in the North Caucasus of Eastern Europe.
No casualties among civilians or law enforcement officers were reported as a result of the operation.
The head of Dagestan, Sergei Melikov, said that the terrorists had been identified due to increased security efforts following the terror attack on the Crocus City Hall venue in the Moscow blast.
A flashback
On Friday, Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) 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 FSB security agency said it had "put an end to the terrorist activities of three nationals from a Central Asian country," Russian news agencies reported.
The three had been "planning to commit a terrorist act by blowing up a device in a public place in the Stavropol region," it added.
The RIA Novosti news agency said the ingredients for an improvised explosive device (IED) and chemical substances had been found at the home of one of the suspects.
The Stavropol region sits in the North Caucasus region of southern Russia, bordering Dagestan and Chechnya among others.
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