Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova published an outraged screed on Sunday claiming the American government was “bailing out” Ukraine by blaming the Islamic State terrorist organization for the massacre of over 130 people at a concert hall outside of Moscow on Friday.
Multiple gunmen opened fire on crowds at the Crocus City concert venue and mall complex on Friday night, indiscriminately firing on attendees at a yet-to-begin concert by the rock band Piknik and others at the mall for sightseeing and other activities. At least one terrorist detonated an explosive or indenciary device, causing a massive fire responsible in part for the high death toll. As of Monday, Russian officials have documented 137 people dead and over 180 injured, warning that the death toll may rise as they find bodies in the rubble and some of the most critically injured succumb to their wounds.
The Islamic State (ISIS) took responsibility for the attack on a Telegram messaging app channel for its “Amaq news agency.” The account published photos allegedly taken by the assailants during the massacre. Following the claim, the government of leftist American President Joe Biden corroborated the claim, specifying that American intelligence suggested the Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISIS-K), its Afghan network, organized and executed the attack.
The Russian government has not agreed publicly with the Islamic State claim. Russian strongman Vladimir Putin said in an address to the nation on Saturday that the men arrested for executing the attack were allegedly “travelling towards Ukraine, where, according to preliminary data, a window was prepared for them on the Ukrainian side to cross the state border.”
He did not mention the Islamic State or radical Islamic terrorism.
Zakharova’s commentary on Sunday, published in the Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda, condemned Washington for corroborating the Islamic State’s claim on the attack and appeared to directly blame the government of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
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Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014, five years before Zelensky became president, and has both backed separatist groups and directly attacked with its military on a consistent basis in the past decade. It has also annexed five Ukrainian territories: Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia.
“The American political engineers cornered themselves with their tales that the Crocus City Hall attack was carried out by the ISIS terror group,” Zakharova wrote, according to a translation of her article by the Russian news agency Tass. “Hence Washington’s daily bailing out of its wards in Kiev, and the attempt to cover itself and the Zelensky regime they created with the scarecrow of the outlawed ISIS.”
Zakharova listed alleged evidence that “directly and indirectly indicates the involvement” of the Biden administration in “Ukrainian terrorism,” including:
[…] billions of dollar and an unprecedented amount of weapons, invested without accountability and with use of corruption schemes into the Kiev regime, the aggressive rhetoric regarding Russia, the rabid nationalism, the ban for peace talks on Ukraine, the endless calls for a force resolution of the conflict, the refusal to condemn the years-long terror attacks, carried out by the Kiev regime, and the massive informational and political support of any, even the most atrocious actions of Zelensky.
Zakharova did not directly identify the Crocus City attack as an example of “Ukrainian terrorism.” She did accuse Washington of “sowing a ‘controlled chaos’ and reshaping the world order by the hands of terrorists,” including as evidence the unfreezing of funding under Biden to USAID that allegedly went to the jihadist terror organization Hamas.
The Foreign Ministry spokeswoman also claimed that comments by former secretary of state and failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton were proof of American support for jihadist terrorism, claiming that she was “almost clapping her hands” when recalling the war between the Soviet Union and mujihadeen terrorists in Afghanistan.
Zakharova was apparently referring to comments Clinton made at a 2009 Congressional hearing in which she, rather than praise the rise of jihadist terror, condemned prior American policies that she claimed had “contributed to it.”
“Let’s remember here… the people we are fighting today we funded them twenty years ago… and we did it because we were locked in a struggle with the Soviet Union,” Clinton admitted, blaming Republican President Ronald Reagan.
“It was President Reagan in partnership with Congress led by Democrats who said you know what it sounds like a pretty good idea… let them come from Saudi Arabia and other countries, importing their Wahabi brand of Islam so that we can go beat the Soviet Union,” she said. “And guess what … they (Soviets) retreated … they lost billions of dollars and it led to the collapse of the Soviet Union.”
The Russian government has identified four men it claimed participated in the Crocus City attack this weekend, presenting them in court. At least one was identified as a Tajik national. Moscow has yet to identify an organization or entity affiliated with the attack.
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