Islamists silent after Russian airport blast

Russia’s Caucasus rebels remained conspicuously silent yesterday after investigators pinned the blame for a Moscow airport bombing that killed 35 people on a 20-year-old man from the restless region.

The Investigative Committee reported in Saturday findings that the suicide bomber was specifically targeting foreigners when he set off his charge on January 24 at the international arrivals hall of Russia’s busiest airport.

The Domodedovo blast killed eight foreign nationals in an attack that – if Moscow’s claims are true – would appear to mark a fundamental shift in the strategy followed by Islamists in their 15-year campaign against Russian rule.

“According to investigators, the act of terror was first and foremost aimed against foreign citizens,” Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin said in televised remarks.

Militants from the predominantly Muslim region that besides Chechnya also includes the impoverished republics of Dagestan and Ingushetia have claimed responsibility for most recent bombings.

But no Islamist organisation or leader has taken credit for an attack that came less than a year after a twin suicide bombing killed 40 people on their way to work on the Moscow subway.

News of the investigators’ airport report was also completely ignored by the three main websites used by Russia’s Islamists.

One of the biggest sites – kavkazcenter.com – this week even went out of its way to scoff at suggestions that it somehow approved of the Moscow attack.

Russian analysts of the region said it was premature to say that militants had indeed shifted their strategy and were now targeting foreigners in a bid to scare off visitors and lucrative investors.

The blast comes at a time when Russia is preparing to show a modern new face to the world at the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi and the 2018 World Cup.