Numerous videos have surfaced of Russian security services torturing suspects, including one in which a suspect is forced to bite off part of his own ear after it has been cut off, the other is stripped half naked, wires are tied to his genitals, and he is given electric shocks. It also included things that were given. .
These videos, posted on a pro-Kremlin Telegram channel, were localized by Russian media to the time and location of the arrest in the western Bryansk region.
Russian authorities identified the four suspects as migrant workers from Tajikistan. Tajikistan shares a border with Afghanistan, and ISIS-K, the branch of the Islamic State that claimed responsibility for the attack on the Crocus City concert hall, is known to be active there.
President Vladimir Putin met with the leaders of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Turkey, Syria, Azerbaijan and Tajikistan over the weekend, despite Putin and Kremlin-controlled media blaming Ukraine for the Islamic State's crimes. I clearly agree with the statement.
President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that the suspects were arrested as they tried to flee to Ukraine, and Russian state media suggested that Western countries may be fabricating Islamic State claims of responsibility to protect Kiev. . Russian authorities have not provided any evidence linking Ukraine to the attack, and President Zelenskiy has denied any involvement in the attack, and President Putin has sought to “shift the blame” for his own security failures. I accused him of being there.
Video and photo evidence of torture were just part of an apparent thirst for revenge. In the days since the attack, several Russian officials have called for the death penalty to be reinstated, raising fears among opposition groups that the Kremlin and security services will use the attack to further escalate their crackdown. There is.
“They have been captured. Thank you to everyone who helped capture them. Should they be killed?” said former President Dmitry Medvedev, currently deputy chairman of Russia's Security Council. Asked. “They should be and they will be,” Medvedev wrote on his Telegram blog on Monday.
“But it is much more important to kill everyone involved. Everyone,” Medvedev added. “Who paid them, who sympathized with them, who helped them? Kill them all.”
After Russia signed various human rights treaties and adopted a new constitution, calls for the reinstatement of the death penalty, which has been banned since 1996, come as pro-invasion forces have become more radical and aggressive since the beginning of the Ukraine war. It has been brought up several times. However, there was no sign of legislative action.
That has changed now. Vladimir Vasilyev, leader of the ruling United Russia faction in the State Duma, said that a plan to reinstate the death penalty would be considered.
“Currently, many questions are floating around regarding the issue of the death penalty. This topic will certainly be studied in depth, professionally and meaningfully,” Vasilyev said in televised remarks. “And decisions will be made that respond to the tone and expectations of our society.”
Some Kremlin propagandists suggested that the death penalty was not enough.
“Looking at the faces of these people makes me realize once again that the death penalty is too easy,” wrote Margarita Simonyan, head of the Propaganda RT network. She proposed “a lifetime of hard labor somewhere underground, with no chance of seeing light, on bread and water, with no conversation allowed, and with not-so-humane guards.”
Russian security services typically deny reports of torture, and the rare leaking of photographic or video evidence leads to public scandals and internal investigations. But on Sunday evening, the four gunmen accused in the attack on Crocus City Hall were photographed being severely beaten in court.
One of them, Saidakrami Ratchabarizoda, had a large bandage wrapped around her ear. The other man, Muhammad Sobir Faizov, was carried to court on a stretcher in a nearly unconscious state.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov declined to comment on the photo at a press conference on Monday. In separate remarks, he said the Kremlin was “currently not participating in discussions” about the death penalty.
Tajikistan's President Emomali Rahmon called Putin on Sunday to distance himself and his people from the suspect.
“Terrorists have no nationality, no homeland, no religion,” Rahmon told President Putin, according to a statement released by his office.
“During the meeting, President Vladimir Putin and Emomali Rahmon said that the special forces and related departments of Russia and Tajikistan are working closely together in the field of counter-terrorism, and that this effort will be strengthened,” the Kremlin said in its own readout. “I pointed out that it was,” he said.
Rahmon on Monday called the attack “a shameful and horrifying incident that should serve as a warning to each of us, especially parents, to pay more serious attention to our parenting.”
“We must protect our teenagers and young adults from the influence of such destructive and frightening groups and movements, and protect our children from defaming the Tajik people, the Tajik sovereign state and their parents. must not be tolerated,” Rahmon said in a statement. on his official website.
Throughout Russia's military intervention in Syria from 2015 to 2017, President Putin often portrayed ISIS as one of Russia's main enemies, and in 2017 he declared victory over ISIS during a visit to the Middle East.
Earlier this month, Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) said it had foiled a planned attack by ISIS-K on a Moscow synagogue and “neutralized” the militants in a raid in the Kaluga region southwest of the capital. . Kazakhstan later confirmed that two of its citizens were killed in the attack.
A year earlier, in February 2023, the FSB announced that it had thwarted an ISIS attack plan on a chemical factory in Kaluga.
But despite the group's long-standing rivalry with ISIS and the group's claim of responsibility, Putin and others have suggested Ukraine was behind Friday's attack.
President Putin said on Saturday that the suspects were arrested while trying to flee to Ukraine, and that “a window was prepared for them to cross the state border from the Ukrainian side.”
Boris Vishnevsky, a prominent opposition lawmaker from St. Petersburg, said Russia could not reinstate the death penalty without rewriting its constitution.
“If we live in a country ruled by laws, it would be pointless to even treat these proposals seriously, because from a constitutional point of view it would be unreasonable to reinstate the death penalty without adopting a new constitution. Because it is possible,” Vishnevsky said. interview. “However, we cannot exclude this possibility because our states are not governed by law and they first formulate the political will and then the laws are adjusted to reflect it. If the president decides to do this, I think there will be legal justification for this, as has happened before.”
Central Asian migrant workers in Russia are already socially marginalized, and Friday's attack raised concerns that some officials may face persecution and harassment from the public and Russian law enforcement. Expressing concern, the Kyrgyz Ministry of Foreign Affairs warned citizens not to travel to Russia unless absolutely necessary.
In particular, it warned people who had committed administrative crimes in Russia in the past not to travel to Russia as they could be detained at the border.
“Citizens residing on the territory of the Russian Federation should refrain from visiting crowded places and always carry an ID card proving their status and the legality of their stay in Russia,” the ministry said.
Tajikistan's embassy in Moscow had previously urged citizens to refrain from attending large events. Baza, a Telegram channel linked to Russian law enforcement, reported that leaders of Russia's Tajik community have issued guidelines warning their compatriots to leave their homes in the evening.
St. Petersburg Governor Alexander Beglov said migrant worker dormitories would be placed under “special control” as part of “new forms of countering the threat of terrorism.”
Natalia Abbakumova and Robyn Dixon contributed to this report.
