Suicide Bomber Strikes Russia. Another ‘Black Widow?’
Photo Credit: Sergei Karpov/Reuters
The blast, which blew out the front windows of the huge Stalin-era structure, was recorded by CCTV and rebroadcast by the state-funded RT network.
In a statement the Kremlin’s Investigative Committee, Russia’s top police body, said that the bombing was “according to available evidence” the work of a female suicide bomber who triggered the device, which was loaded with shrapnel, as she approached the metal detectors near the station’s entrance and became nervous when she spotted a police officer. According to the statement, the casualties might have been far greater if she had succeeded in penetrating into the inner waiting area, which was crammed with New Year’s travelers preparing to board trains.
No one has claimed responsibility.
A similar bombing barely two months ago, which demolished a Volgograd city bus and killed six people, was revealed to be the work of a female suicide bomber from Russia’s insurgency-wracked southern province of Dagestan. Such women have been dubbed “black widows” because they often turn out to be family members of Islamist rebels killed by Russian security forces, recruited to stage revenge attacks on “soft” Russian targets.
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