KavkazCenter - Blasts ripping through Moscow

Blasts ripping through Moscow

At least 50 people died and 150 were injured in the blast that happened in the early rush hour in Moscow subway between the stations Avtozavodskaya and Paveletskaya. It is one of the very latest reports about the blast in the Moscow metro that happened Friday morning.

The rescuers and officials do not rule out the fact that there may be a much larger number of victims.

«At 8:32 Moscow Time a blast happened near the first door of the second subway car, after the train traveled about 300 meters from Avtozavodskaya subway station. As a result, metal and glass structures of the second car were knocked outwards and the structures of the third car were pressed inwards by the blast wave», Moscow deputy mayor Valery Shantsev told journalists.

Spokesman of Russian Emergencies Ministry said that it is hard to give an accurate count of the dead because many body parts have been found. An ambulance doctor told Reuters at the scene that the number of dead might be 60 to 70. Interfax news agency reported 40 people dead. About 700 people were brought out of the tunnel. The evacuation is over and the fire has been put out.

«Judging from the number of people in that subway car, the number of dead is a lot more than 30», - a rescue worker told Reuters.

«There is a chance that the blast was carried out by a suicide bomber», a Moscow city police official said. But Moscow deputy mayor Shantsev however told journalists that even though the law enforcement agencies have no doubt it was a terrorist act, it was not carried out by a suicide bomber.

«There is no way a suicide bomber could carry so much explosives on him. Prior cases showed that their belts were stuffed with balls and other things like that… that kill people standing around them», Shantsev said. – «It was a different device, it had no striking elements in it, but it was still very powerful. The investigation will determine how the device got there (into the subway car) and where that person is».

The photos made at the scene of the incident show that the car in the epicenter of the blast was totally destroyed and bodies of victims are lying all around it.

Reuters reported that after the blast all roads were blocked within the 300-meter radius around Avtozavodskaya station when the victims of the blast and fire were being brought out. The police cordoned off the subway pavilion and the journalists were not allowed to get any closer than 100 meters away.

«The explosion was at the front of the second car in a tunnel. As soon as the train stopped people began climbing out through windows and doors and walked to Paveletskaya station on de-energized tracks through the tunnel», an eyewitness who gave her name only as Ludmila, aged 31, told Reuters. Her face was blackened with soot; she was staggering and smelling ammonium chloride for relief. This footage was shown on TV.

Moscow subway system is one of the largest in the world and about 8.5 million people use the metro system every day. During a rush hour there are about 100 people in one subway car. Victims said that the car was packed and it was hard to get in at Avtozavodskaya station.

Zamoskvoretskaya line, the metro system's green line, is the busiest. It services 1.2 million people each day.

«We were just riding on the subway train and then some loud clap was heard, smoke started coming out and the train stopped. There was no panic. It was some weird muffled feeling, and there was no fear because of the suddenness», Doctor Ilya Blokhin, 31, told journalists. Dr. Blokhin was in the car next to last, which was pretty far away from the epicenter.

The subway car where the blast occurred was damaged so much that it seemed impossible to bring it to the station in the middle of fire and smoke. The train crew was the first to report the blast, then the contact was lost. According to the latest reports, all members of the maintenance crew working at the scene had died.

Judging from the first statements made by the Russian authorities, Chechens will almost for sure be the main suspects in organizing the subway blast. There is a noticeable fact that even though the war in the Caucasus has been going on for the past 10 years, all this time the Moscow subway has remained relatively safe and there have been no attempts to carry out any major act of sabotage, except for two or three cases with minor explosions that had nothing to do with the war in Chechnya.

Virtually all commentators and observers have been pointing at a possible link of the Friday blast in Moscow with Russia's ongoing aggression against Chechen Republic of Ichkeria (CRI). However, Vice Premier of CRI Akhmed Zakayev made a statement where he denied any involvement of CRI Armed Forces in the blast in Moscow metro.

Let us remind that according to various human rights organizations, independent experts and the Chechen government, Russian troops have killed over 250,000 Chechen peaceful civilians during the Russian-Chechen war. About 400 towns and villages of Ichkeria have been partially or totally wiped off the face of the earth. Capital of Ichkeria Jokhar was 90% destroyed. 300,000 to 400,000 CRI citizens became refugees. The number of civilian casualties throughout the time of the Russian aggression exceeded 25% out of the entire Chechen population.Department of Strategic Information,

Kavkaz-Center