MOSCOW (Reuters) -Knife-wielding prisoners figuring out themselves as Islamic State militants staged a lethal assault on guards in a Russian penal colony on Friday and seized hostages, in line with state media and information shops with ties to the safety providers.
In a video posted by information channel Mash, three uniformed jail officers might be seen mendacity immobile in swimming pools of blood on the ground, one along with his throat reduce. One other was sitting upright in a doorway, the place a person with a knife was holding him by the neck.
Russia state media stated no less than one member of the jail workers had been killed, however the video urged the loss of life toll was nearly definitely increased.
One of many attackers shouted within the video that they have been “mujahideen” of Islamic State and had seized management of the jail within the Volgograd area.
President Vladimir Putin stated in televised remarks that he had been briefed by the top of the jail service.
Putin, addressing a weekly assembly of his Safety Council, didn’t cross any touch upon the unfolding state of affairs however stated he needed to listen to the ideas of the inside minister and the top of the FSB safety service.
The jail service stated in a press release: “Throughout a session of a disciplinary fee, convicts took workers of the penal establishment as hostages. Measures are at present being taken to free the hostages. There are casualties.”
The jail is designated as a “harsh regime” penal colony with capability to carry as much as 1,241 male prisoners.
Footage and video circulating on social media appeared to point out 4 attackers. Information websites stated that they had been confined to 1 block of the jail, and photographs confirmed them pacing about in a big yard.
A member of the jail workers, his face coated in blood, might be seen with them within the yard, his fingers sure behind his again.
The boys’s calls for weren’t clear. One in all them stated within the video that that they had acted “with out mercy” in response to alleged mistreatment of Muslim prisoners.
Information websites with safety connections printed the names of 4 alleged attackers, figuring out them as residents of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. There was no official affirmation of their id and motives.
Russia, whose defence and safety businesses are closely centered on its conflict in Ukraine, has seen a current upsurge in Islamist militant assaults.
In June, a bloody Islamic State-linked jail rebellion befell within the southern area of Rostov, the place particular forces shot lifeless six inmates who had taken hostages.
Later that month, no less than 20 folks have been killed in capturing assaults in two cities in Dagestan, a primarily Muslim area of southern Russia.
In March, Islamic State claimed accountability for an assault through which gunmen raided the Crocus Metropolis live performance corridor close to Moscow, sprayed the viewers with automated weapons fireplace and set fireplace to the constructing, killing greater than 140 folks.
(Reporting by Reuters in Moscow and Filipp Lebedev in London; writing by Mark Trevelyan; enhancing by William Maclean and Mark Heinrich)
