‘Extremely Hard To Believe’: Russia Doubts Islamic State’s Ability To Conduct Moscow Terror Attack – News18

The Russian foreign ministry Wednesday said it is ‘hard to believe’ Islamic State could launch the kind of attack Moscow witnessed last week when terrorists stormed the Crocus City Hall and killed at least 140 people who were there to attend a concert by Soviet-era rock group, Piknik.

Islamic State’s Khorasan wing (ISIS-K) has claimed responsibility for the attack. The group, an offshoot of the original Islamic State which once ruled parts of Syria and Iraq, is one of the most active regional affiliates of the Islamic State militant group.

However, Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in her weekly press briefing that it’s “extremely hard to believe” that Islamic State could be able to conduct such an attack, according to a report by the Guardian.

She also accused Ukraine of remaining silent and not condemning the attack. “President of Ukraine Zelensky was the only one to accuse Russia of the terrorist attack at the Crocus City Hall. Almost all countries have condemned the attack at the Crocus City Hall. Only Kiev remained silent,” she said.

“The Ukrainian social media are posting cynical and inhuman comments. Some in Ukraine probably derive cannibalistic pleasure from human deaths, pain and suffering,” she further added.

Russian President Vladimir Putin acknowledged that the Islamic State could be behind the attack. “We know that the crime was carried out by the hand of radical Islamists with an ideology that the Muslim world has fought for centuries,” Putin said in remarks posted on the Telegram messaging app but he did not directly mention Islamic State in the aftermath of the attack.

He then went on to say that there are links to Ukraine by highlighting that the attackers were headed toward the neighbouring country with whom Russia is fighting a war for the last two years.

“This atrocity may be just a link in a whole series of attempts by those who have been at war with our country since 2014 by the hands of the neo-Nazi Kyiv regime. We know by whose hand the crime against Russia and its people was committed. But what is of interest to us is who ordered it,” he further added.

Not just the Russian authorities, several other pro-Kremlin commentators have blamed Ukraine for the attack.

“We are not talking about ISIS here. It was the khokhly,” said the editor-in-chief of the RT channel Margarita Simonyan, using a term used pejoratively in Russia to denote Ukrainians, following the attack.

The US and France said that it has credible evidence that the IS was behind the attack but Russian officials have repeatedly cast doubt on Western intelligence and Ukraine has denied Russian accusations of being involved in the attack.

“ISIS-K has been plotting attacks within Russia for some time,” said Aaron Zelin, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute For Near East Policy, a US think tank, while speaking to Reuters. He noted that recent attempts by the group to strike within Russia had been unsuccessful.

A separate report by Reuters cited General Michael Kurilla, the commander of US Central Command, who told Congress last March that ISIS-K was quickly developing the ability to conduct “external operations” in Europe and Asia. He predicted it would be able to attack US and Western interests outside Afghanistan “in as little as six months and with little to no warning”.

“ISIS-Khorasan retains the capability and will to attack US and Western interests abroad in as little as six months and with little to no warning,” Kurilla told a Senate committee hearing this month.