“International terrorist organizations” points behind the deadly attacks that occurred in the previous month in Dagestan, the leader of the predominantly Muslim region.
State media reported that Sergei Melikov stated that 22 people died in the June 23 attackswhose targets included churches and synagogues.
Melikov insists on an external threat
Western security experts said the attacks were further evidence that Russia, preoccupied with the war in Ukraine, faces a growing problem with Islamic extremist violence at home. But Melikov insisted the threat was external.
“The main threat factor affecting the situation in democracy remains the increased activity of international terrorist organizations,” he said, quoted by the state news agency RIA.
“And no matter how much they try to convince us that the events in Dagestan took place inside the country, I will never believe it.”
He said there was direct and indirect evidence pointing to the role of “our direct enemies” in the attacks, but did not specify who they were or what the evidence was.
“And in this regard, it is not necessary for Western or other trainers to be on the territory of Dagestan, because today these special services and leaders of terrorist organizations use the Internet, social networks and can very well influence both the training and the ideological state of people who are capable of such crimes,” he added.
The attacks in Dagestan came three months after gunmen stormed a concert hall near Moscow, shelled it with automatic weapons and set it ablaze, killing 145 people in a massacre claimed by the Islamic State group.
Russia, without providing evidence, blamed Ukraine for the attack. Kiev dismissed the claim as absurd.
RIA reports that Dagestan’s senior Muslim cleric said during a meeting with Melikov that a religious decree, or fatfa, banning the wearing of the niqab would be issued soon. Reports after the June 23 attacks said one of the attackers planned to escape by wearing a niqab.
Reverend Ahmed Abdulayev was quoted as saying that the niqab would be banned until peace and tranquility were restored in the region and that men who did not want to see their wives’ faces in public should keep them at home.
Sources: AMPE, Reuters