MOSCOW (AP) — Russia's top security agency said Monday it has broken up what it called a "terrorist cell" in southern Russia whose members had provided weapons and cash to suspected attackers of the Moscow concert hall.
The Federal Security Service, or FSB, said that on Sunday it detained four suspected members of the cell in the Russian province of Dagestan in the North Caucasus.
The agency alleged that the suspects detained in Dagestan were involved in channeling funds and providing weapons to the gunmen who attacked the concert hall on Moscow's western edge on March 22, killing 144 people in the deadliest attack on Russian soil in two decades.
“The detained militants directly participated in financing the perpetrators of the March 22 terror attack on the Crocus City Hall in Moscow and providing them with terror means,” the FSB said in a statement.
It said one of the suspects detained in Dagestan had confessed to personally bringing weapons to the Moscow attackers.
The FSB released a video showing one of the suspects saying that they also planned an attack in the city of Kaspiysk in Dagestan. It wasn’t clear whether the two confessions came from the same person.
The agency said the suspects are foreign nationals, without specifying their nationality. The suspected attackers of the Moscow concert hall arrested hours after the March 22 raid are citizens of the Central Asian nation of Tajikistan.
The detention of four suspects in Dagestan follows the arrest of the four suspected gunmen and seven others who were accused of involvement in the attack.
An affiliate of the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack. President Vladimir Putin acknowledged that “radical Islamists” conducted the raid, but alleged — without providing evidence — that Ukraine and the West were involved, despite Kyiv's vehement denials.
Also on Monday, a Moscow court ordered a suspected accomplice of the attackers to two months in pretrial detention. Suspect Yakubjoni Yusufzoda, a Tajikistan citizen, allegedly provided money for accommodation for the gunmen, Russian news reports said.
He was detained four days after the attack and jailed for failure to obey police, but now is charged with committing fatal terrorism, the reports said. He is the 10th person charged in the case.
A group of ambassadors of foreign diplomatic missions attend a laying ceremony at a makeshift memorial in front of the Crocus City Hall on the western outskirts of Moscow, Russia, Saturday, March 30, 2024. (Sergei Ilnitsky/Pool Photo via AP)
A group of ambassadors of foreign diplomatic missions attend a laying ceremony at a makeshift memorial in front of the Crocus City Hall on the western outskirts of Moscow, Russia, Saturday, March 30, 2024. (Sergei Ilnitsky/Pool Photo via AP)
Russia on Monday threatened to strike British military facilities and said it would hold drills simulating the use of battlefield nuclear weapons amid sharply rising tensions over comments by senior Western officials about possibly deeper involvement in the war in Ukraine.
After summoning the British ambassador to the Foreign Ministry, Moscow warned that Ukrainian strikes on Russian territory with U.K.-supplied weapons could bring retaliatory strikes against British military facilities and equipment on Ukrainian soil or elsewhere.
The remarks came on the eve of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inauguration to a fifth term in office and in a week when Moscow on Thursday will celebrate Victory Day, its most important secular holiday, marking its defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.
The drills are a response to “provocative statements and threats of certain Western officials regarding the Russian Federation,” the Defense Ministry said in a statement.
It was the first time Russia has publicly announced drills involving tactical nuclear weapons, although its strategic nuclear forces regularly hold exercises. Tactical nuclear weapons include air bombs, warheads for short-range missiles and artillery munitions and are meant for use on a battlefield. They are less powerful than the strategic weapons — massive warheads that arm intercontinental ballistic missiles and are intended to obliterate entire cities.
The Russian announcement was a warning to Ukraine’s Western allies about becoming more deeply engaged in the 2-year-old war, where the Kremlin's forces have gained an upper hand amid Ukraine's shortage of manpower and weapons. Some of Ukraine’s Western partners have previously expressed concern that the conflict could spill beyond Ukraine into a war between NATO and Russia.
French President Emmanuel Macron repeated last week that he doesn’t exclude sending troops to Ukraine, and U.K. Foreign Secretary David Cameron said Kyiv’s forces will be able to use British long-range weapons to strike targets inside Russia. Some other NATO countries providing weapons to Kyiv have balked at that possibility.
The Kremlin branded those comments as dangerous, heightening tension between Russia and NATO. The war already has placed significant strain on relations between Moscow and the West.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday that Macron’s recent statement and other remarks by British and U.S. officials had prompted the nuclear drills.
“It’s a new round of escalation,” Peskov said, referring to what the Kremlin regarded as provocative statements. “It’s unprecedented and requires special attention and special measures.”
Russia’s Foreign Ministry summoned both the French and British ambassadors. It urged the British ambassador “to think about the inevitable catastrophic consequences of such hostile steps from London."
Sweden’s Foreign Minister Tobias Billström said the nuclear exercises “contribute to increasing instability.”
“In the current security situation, Russia’s actions may be considered particularly irresponsible and reckless,” Billström told Swedish news agency TT.
Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy head of Russia’s Security Council that's chaired by Putin, said in his typically hawkish fashion that the comments by Macron and Cameron risked pushing the nuclear-armed world toward a “global catastrophe.”
It wasn’t the first time Europe’s military support for Ukraine has prompted nuclear saber-rattling. In March 2023, after the U.K.’s decision to provide Ukraine with armor-piercing shells containing depleted uranium, Putin said he intends to deploy tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of Ukraine neighbor Belarus.
The ministry said the exercise is intended to “increase the readiness of non-strategic nuclear forces to fulfill combat tasks” and will be held on Putin’s orders. The maneuvers will involve missile units of the Southern Military District along with the air force and the navy, it said.
The Russian announcement stirred little reaction in Ukraine, where the spokesman for the Military Intelligence agency, Andrii Yusov, said on national television: “Nuclear blackmail is a usual practice of Putin’s regime; it does not constitute major news.”
Western officials have blamed Russia for threatening a wider war through provocative acts. NATO countries said last week they are deeply concerned by a campaign of hybrid activities on the military alliance’s soil, accusing Moscow of being behind them and saying they represent a security threat.
Peskov dismissed those claims as “new, unfounded accusations leveled at our country.”
Germany said Monday it recalled its ambassador to Russia for a week of consultations in Berlin following an alleged computer hack of Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s party.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian drones hit two vehicles Monday in Russia’s Belgorod region, killing six people and injuring 35 others, including two children, local authorities said. The area has been hit by Kyiv’s forces in recent months.
One of the vehicles was a minibus carrying farm workers, Belgorod Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov said.
It was not possible to independently confirm the report.
While Ukraine’s army is largely pinned down on the 1,000-kilometer (600-mile) front line due to a shortage of troops and ammunition after more than two years of fighting, it has used its long-range firepower to hit targets deep inside Russia.
In what has largely been a war of attrition, Russia also has relied heavily on long-range missile, artillery and drones to wreak damage on Ukraine.
The Kremlin's forces kept up their bombardment of Ukraine's power grid, with a nighttime Russian drone attack targeting energy infrastructure in Ukraine’s northern region of Sumy. Multiple towns and villages in the region, including Sumy, lost power, regional authorities said.
Russia attacked Ukrainian targets with 13 Shahed drones overnight, 12 of which were intercepted in the Sumy region, Ukraine’s air force said.
Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
Paramedic evacuation crew driver codename Kum smokes a cigarette with comrades as they wait for injured soldiers in an medical point in the area of Avdiivka close to Donetsk, Ukraine, Saturday, May 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Paramedic evacuation crew member codename Livsi waits for injured soldiers in an medical point in the area of Avdiivka close to Donetsk, Ukraine, Saturday, May 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Paramedic evacuation crew driver codename Kum, left, talks on a walkie talkie next to comrade codename Livsi as they wait for injured soldiers in an medical point in the area of Avdiivka close to Donetsk, Ukraine, Saturday, May 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
FILE - In this photo taken from video provided by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Tuesday, Jan. 25, 2022, The Russian army's Iskander missile launchers take positions during drills in Russia. The Russian Defense Ministry said that the military will hold drills involving tactical nuclear weapons – the first time such exercise was publicly announced by Moscow. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP, File)
FILE - This photo taken from video provided by the Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Feb. 19, 2022, shows a Yars intercontinental ballistic missile being launched from an air field during military drills in Russia. The Russian Defense Ministry said that the military will hold drills involving tactical nuclear weapons – the first time such exercise was publicly announced by Moscow. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP, File)
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Russian S-400 anti-aircraft missile system launchers and APCs roll during a rehearsal for the Victory Day military parade at Dvortsovaya (Palace) Square in St. Petersburg, Russia, Sunday, May 5, 2024. The parade will take place at St. Petersburg's Palace Square on May 9 to celebrate 79 years since the victory in WWII. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)
FILE - Russian President Vladimir Putin addresses members of the Defense Ministry, the National Guard, the Interior Ministry, the Federal Security Service and the Federal Guard Service at the Kremlin, in Moscow on June 27, 2023. Putin will begins his fifth term as Russian president in an opulent Kremlin inauguration on Tuesday after destroying his political opposition, launching a devastating war in Ukraine and consolidating power. (Sergei Guneyev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP, File)
FILE - In this photo released by the Russian Defense Ministry on March 19, 2024, a Russian tank fires at Ukrainian troops from a position near the border with Ukraine in Russia’s Belgorod region. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP, File)
