The director of Russia's most powerful security agency said yesterday that he believes Ukraine, along with the US and Britain, were involved in the attack on a concert hall near Moscow that killed at least 139 people.
Ukraine, which has repeatedly denied any involvement in Friday's attack, dismissed the Russian accusations as lies. The Islamic State militant group claimed responsibility for the mass shooting.
"We believe that the action was prepared by Islamist radicals and that it was facilitated by Western special services," Alexander Bortnikov, director of the Federal Security Service (FSB), said on television, Reuters reported.
"Ukraine's special services are directly connected to it," Bortnikov said, adding that Kiev had helped train Islamist radicals at an undisclosed location in the Middle East.
Asked by Russian journalists whether Ukraine and its allies, the US and Britain, were involved in the attack on the concert hall, Bortnikov said: "We think that is the case. In any case, we are now talking about the information we have. This is general information ".
Lies are officially spread by Patrushev, followed by FSB chief Bortnikov, said the advisor to the President of Ukraine
Bortnikov, 72, who has headed the FSB since 2008, said Russian authorities had not yet identified those who ordered the attack, but said retaliatory measures would be taken. He did not offer concrete evidence for claims that, according to Reuters, hardliners in Moscow could use to justify the escalation of the war in Ukraine and to explain why Russian security services did not prevent the attack.
The Russian portal SHOT published a recording of a conversation in which a journalist asks Nikolai Patrushev, the secretary of the Russian Security Council, whether it was "ISIS or Ukraine?"
"Ukraine, of course," replied Patrushev. When later asked about that statement, he said there were "many" indications of Ukrainian involvement.
The adviser to the Ukrainian president, Mihailo Podoljak, rejected the Russian claims as lies.
"Lies are officially spread by Patrushev, followed by FSB chief Bortnikov," said Podoljak.
Two U.S. officials said Friday that the U.S. has intelligence that supports IS' claim that it was responsible for the deadly shooting in Podmoskovlje.
A spokeswoman for the US National Security Council, Adrienne Watson, said that Washington had shared intelligence with Russia about a planned attack in Moscow earlier this month. When asked about this information, Bortnikov said that it is not always very specific.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that all those responsible for the attack on the concert hall would be punished.
On Monday, he said for the first time that radical Islamists carried out the attack, but that the attackers were trying to escape to Ukraine. He also questioned why Islamists would want to attack Russia right now without being encouraged by others.
"We know that the crime was committed by radical Islamists with an ideology against which the Muslim world has been fighting for centuries," Putin said. "We want to know who ordered it".
Bonus video:
