RUSSIA: A SUICIDE BOMB ATTACK HAS KILLED AT LEAST FIVE PEOPLE IN THE HEART OF MOSCOW

Record ID: 355602

  • Title: RUSSIA: A SUICIDE BOMB ATTACK HAS KILLED AT LEAST FIVE PEOPLE IN THE HEART OF MOSCOW
  • Date: 9th December 2003
  • Summary: (W4) MOSCOW, RUSSIA (DECEMBER 9, 2003) (REUTERS) 1. SLV POLICE CARS, MEN AND AMBULANCES AT SITE OF BOMBING ON SNOWY MOSCOW STREET 0.06 2. SLV BLOODY BODY ON GROUND NEXT TO CAR 0.11 3. SLV FRONT OF NATIONAL HOTEL 0.17 4. SLV TOWERS OF KREMLIN ACROSS FROM HOTEL, EMERGENCY CREW CAR DRIVING UP 0.24 5. SLV POLICEMAN WITH SNIFFER
  • Embargoed: 24th December 2003 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: MOSCOW, RUSSIA
  • Country: Russia
  • Reuters ID: LVAC03WKU2ZNFOZ7R030MS2K4LTM
  • Story Text: A suicide bomb attack has killed at least five
    people in the heart of Moscow.




    A suicide bomb attack has killed at least five
    people in the heart of Moscow on Tuesday (December 9), just
    two days after Russian voters handed President Vladimir
    Putin an even tighter grip on power.

    After the explosion, bodies lay unattended on the
    pavement outside the National Hotel, near the capital's
    main shopping street and looking out over the Kremlin,
    where Putin was meeting regional deputies.

    A woman's severed head lay on the pavement.

    A spokesman for the interior ministry told reporters
    shortly after the blast that police had not yet ruled out
    any possible scenarios as to the perpetrators of the
    attack.

    Interior Ministry spokesman Kirill Mazurin said, "There
    are four bodies strewn around and seven more wounded were
    taken to different hospitals in Moscow, not much time has
    passed since the blast. As you see, the range of the
    explosion was quite extensive. We cannot give any exact
    details at the moment, from what we can see at the moment,"
    said Mazurin.

    It is the second suicide bombing in Russia in five
    days and the second deadly bomb attack in the capital this
    year. The first, which killed 15 people at an outdoor
    concert in July, was blamed on Chechen separatists.

    After removing the bodies on Tuesday (December 9),
    police and bomb disposal squads at the scene used a
    remote-controlled robotic bomb detector to check a
    suspicious briefcase near the National Hotel. A crowd
    gathered to watch it detonate the item -- apparently not a
    bomb -- in a controlled explosion.

    "At first I thought it (the bombing) was fireworks,
    but it was too big, and then we looked at each other and
    understood it was a bomb," said one bystander, Nikolai.

    Moscow's Mayor Yuri Luzhkov said the explosion may
    have been the work of one or possibly two women suicide
    bombers.

    Putin, speaking at a pre-planned Kremlin event, called
    for new action to halt "terrorists", saying they were
    trying to undermine Russia's economic and democratic
    development.

    "The actions of criminals, terrorists which we have to
    confront even today are aimed against all that."
    Itar-Tass news agency said the bomb had been packed
    with nails and metal pieces, making its effect more
    devastating when it went off just before 11 a.m.

    It quoted security sources as saying that one of the
    suicide bombers had been on a police wanted list and was
    suspected of having undergone training at a camp for armed
    militants.

    The attack cast another shadow over Sunday's election
    for parliament's lower house, which handed an overwhelming
    victory to Putin's political allies but was criticised in
    the West.

    Last Friday (December 5), two days before the vote, an
    apparent suicide attack on a commuter train near Russia's
    rebel Chechnya region killed at least 44 people.


  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2015. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
Register