May 14, 2003 Posted: 16:32 Moscow time (12:32 GMT)
VLADIKAVKAZ - A female suicide bomber blew herself up Wednesday at a religious
service in northern Chechnya, killing at least 12 people and wounding dozens
of others in the second major attack in the breakaway republic in the past
three days.
Maj. General Ruslan Avtayev of the Ministry of Emergency Situations said
that the woman detonated a bomb she was wearing among the mourners during
a funeral service, killing 12 people and wounding seven to 10 more. The
Interfax news agency, citing a Chechen security council member, said 20
people had been killed.
Shamsail Saraliyev, a Chechen administration official, said the attack had
occurred in the settlement of Iliskhan-Yurt in northeastern Chechnya, Interfax
reported. The injured were taken to nearby hospitals.
The attacker apparently was trying to kill Akhmad Kadyrov, the head of Chechnya's
Moscow-backed administration, who was in attendance, Interfax said. Several
thousand people had gathered for the prayer service.
Wednesday's attack came just two days after a deadly truck bombing that
shattered a government compound in northern Chechnya. The death toll in
that attack rose to 59 on Wednesday.
Akhmed Dzheirkhanov, the deputy minister for emergency situations in Chechnya,
said four people had died overnight as a result of injuries sustained in
Monday's blast.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, at a meeting with NATO-Secretary General
Lord Robertson on Tuesday, compared the bombing in Chechnya on Monday to
the deadly blast in Saudi Arabia aimed at foreigners.
"The signature in both places is absolutely identical," said Putin, who is seeking
to portray Russia's war in Chechnya as part of the international campaign against
terrorism.
Col. Ilya Shabalkin, a regional Russian commander in the Caucasus, said Wednesday
on Russian television that the mastermind of Monday's bombing was Abu Walid, a
Saudi Arabian national. Shabalkin said Abu Walid had replaced Omar Ibn al Khattab,
a prominent Saudi-born warlord who is alleged to have been killed by poisoning
last year in Chechnya. Shabalkin presented no proof to back up his claim. Other
officials said it was too early to know who was behind the attack.
The blasts raised questions about the level of security provided by federal forces
in the war-shattered republic. Kadyrov said this week that responsibility for
fighting rebels should be switched to the region's own Interior Ministry instead
of the Moscow-based Federal Security Service and Russian troops.