Russia links West, Ukraine to Moscow massacre

The head of the FSB intelligence agency says the attackers were to be greeted in Ukraine as heroes

The head of Russia’s intelligence agency said Tuesday that Western and Ukrainian intelligence services had helped the attackers who stormed a Moscow concert venue last week, killing 139 people.

“We believe the action was prepared both by the radical Islamists themselves and, of course, facilitated by Western special services, and Ukraine’s special services themselves have a direct connection to this,” the head of the Federal Security Service Alexander Bortnikov said in comments carried by Russian news agencies.

“I’ll let you in on a little secret: they were going to be greeted as heroes on the other side,” Bortnikov added. The accusations were made as a Russian court on Tuesday remanded an eighth suspect of the massacre in custody. Moscow earlier announced it had detained 11 people in connection with the attack, which saw camouflaged gunmen storm into Crocus City Hall, open fire on concert-goers and set the building ablaze.

The court’s press service said the latest suspect to be remanded was a man originally from the Central Asian country of Kyrgyzstan.

Officials said he was ordered to be held in detention until at least 22 May, without detailing the exact accusations against him.

Four men charged on Sunday with carrying out the attack are citizens of Tajikistan, also in mainly Muslim Central Asia.

Three more suspects — reportedly from the same family and including at least one Russian citizen — were charged on terrorrelated offenses on Monday.

The attack in Moscow, Russia’s bloodiest in over two decades, was claimed by the Islamic State group.

President Vladimir Putin on Monday acknowledged for the first time that “radical Islamists” were behind last week’s attack, but suggested they were linked to Ukraine somehow.

Ukraine has described accusations it was involved as absurd.