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TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — The 4 males charged with the massacre at a Moscow theater have been recognized by authorities as residents of Tajikistan, a few of the 1000’s who migrate to Russia annually from the poorest of the previous Soviet republics to scrape out marginal existences.
Together with grinding poverty, Tajikistan is rife with spiritual tensions. Arduous-line Islamists had been one of many fundamental forces opposing the federal government in a Nineties civil conflict that devastated the nation. The militants claiming accountability for the Moscow massacre that killed 137 people — a department of the Islamic State group in neighboring Afghanistan — reportedly recruit closely from Tajikistan.
The 4 suspects who had been arraigned in a Moscow court docket late Sunday on terrorism charges appeared to have been overwhelmed or injured throughout their detention. One was wheeled in on a gurney clad solely in a hospital robe.
Here’s a take a look at the individuals, militant teams and political historical past related to the Moscow assault:
THE SUSPECTS
The eldest defendant is Dalerdzhon Mirzoyev, 32, who might have been residing in Russia illegally. He was proven sitting in a glass cage within the courtroom with a black eye and bruised face.
Mirzoyev reportedly had obtained a three-month residency allow within the metropolis of Novosibirsk, nevertheless it had expired. In video of his interrogation shared on Russian social media, he reportedly says he just lately was residing in a Moscow hostel with one other of the suspects. The court docket mentioned he’s married and has 4 kids, nevertheless it was unclear if he was employed.
Saidakrami Murodali Rachabalizoda, 30, is seemingly unemployed. Registered as a resident in Russia, he couldn’t keep in mind in what metropolis, in response to Russian information reviews. When he appeared in court docket, his head was awkwardly bandaged after Russian officers reportedly sawed off considered one of his ears.
Shamsidin Fariduni, 25, apparently had essentially the most secure lifetime of the 4 suspects. He was registered in Krasnogorsk, the Moscow suburb the place the killings came about, and labored in a flooring manufacturing facility. He reportedly informed interrogators that he was supplied 500,000 rubles (about $5,425) to hold out the assault — the equal of about 2.5 years of the common wage in Tajikistan.
Mukhammadsobir Fayzov, 19, was introduced into the courtroom on a gurney, with a catheter hooked up and one eye injured or lacking, and he appeared to fade in an out of consciousness. He had labored as an apprentice in a barbershop within the declining textile-mill metropolis of Ivanovo, however reviews mentioned he left that job in November.
ISLAMIC TENSIONS IN TAJIKISTAN
As many as 1.5 million Tajik migrants are estimated to be in Russia after fleeing the poverty and unemployment that plague their landlocked, mountainous nation. An array of mineral assets are current in Tajikistan, however the business has been sluggish to develop due to belated international funding and poor geological information, amongst different elements.
Though its almost 10 million persons are overwhelmingly Muslim, tensions related to Islam are rife.
Islamists had been a key opponent throughout a 1992-97 civil conflict wherein the federal government killed as many as 150,000 individuals and devastated the economic system. When the conflict ended, Tajik President Emomali Rahmon took steps to sharply curtail spiritual freedoms.
The federal government restricted what number of mosques could possibly be constructed, prohibited girls and kids underneath 18 from attending mosques in any respect, and banned spiritual instruction outdoors the house for youngsters. Critics say the boundaries inspired individuals to show to underground and radical Muslim factions through the web.
Tajikistan has not made any official assertion in regards to the arrest of the 4 males suspected within the assault. However Rahmon was quoted by his authorities’s press service as telling Russian President Vladimir Putin in a cellphone name that “terrorists have neither nationality, nor a homeland, nor faith.”
ISLAMIC STATE VS. RUSSIA
Most assaults tied to Islamic extremists that stricken Russia up to now quarter century had been dedicated by Chechen separatists, such because the 2004 Beslan faculty seizure that killed greater than 300 individuals — or had been blamed on them, as within the 1999 condo bombings that triggered the second Russia-Chechnya conflict.
However assaults that started in 2015 had been claimed by or attributed to the Islamic State group. The group opposed Russia’s intervention in Syria, the place Moscow sought to tip the stability in favor of President Bashar Assad’s forces.
After IS declared a caliphate in massive elements of Syria and Iraq in June 2014, 1000’s of women and men from all over the world got here to affix the extremist group. These included 1000’s from the previous Soviet Union, amongst them a whole bunch from Tajikistan.
Probably the most outstanding figures to affix IS was Gulmurod Khalimov, who was an officer with Tajikistan’s particular forces earlier than defecting and becoming a member of IS in Syria in 2015. In 2017, the Russian army mentioned Khalimov was killed in a Russian airstrike in Syria.
IS claimed accountability for the 2015 bombing of a Russian airliner that was bringing vacationers dwelling from the Egyptian resort Sharm al-Sheik. Two years later, it claimed to be behind the suicide bombing of a subway prepare in St. Petersburg that killed 15 individuals.
Two weeks earlier than the Moscow theater bloodbath, Russian officers mentioned they’d worn out members of an IS cell that was planning to assault a synagogue. Earlier within the month, it reported killing six IS fighters within the Ingushetia area adjoining to Chechnya.
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Bassem Mroue in Beirut, Lebanon, contributed to this report.
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