List of people allegedly involved in Russian apartment bombings

The Russian apartment bombings were a series of five bombings in Russia that took place in Moscow and two other Russian towns during ten days of September 1999. Altogether nearly 300 civilians were killed at night. The bombings, together with the Dagestan War, led the country into the Second Chechen War. Chechen militants were blamed but no Chechen field commander accepted responsibility for the bombings and Chechen president Aslan Maskhadov denied any involvement of his government.

The bombings ceased when a similar bomb was found and defused in an apartment block in the Russian city of Ryazan on September 23. Later in the evening Vladimir Putin praised the vigilance of the Ryzanians and ordered the air bombing of Grozny, which marked the beginning of the Second Chechen War.[1] A few hours later, three FSB agents who had planted the bomb were caught by the local police. This incident was declared to be a training exercise by FSB director Nikolai Patrushev.

Russian Parliament member Yuri Shchekochikhin filed two motions for a parliamentary investigation of the events, but the motions were rejected by the Russian Duma in March 2000. An independent[2] public commission to investigate the bombings chaired by Duma deputy Sergei Kovalev was hampered by government refusal to respond to its inquiries, and its chairmen admitted that he has no evidence to support any version of the events.[3][4] Two key members of the Kovalev Commission, Sergei Yushenkov and Yuri Shchekochikhin, both Duma members, have since died in apparent assassinations. The Commission's lawyer Mikhail Trepashkin was arrested.

A number of people were convicted or accused of involvement in the bombings.

Official suspects

According to official investigation, the following people either delivered explosives, stored them, or harbored other suspects:

Arab-born Mujahid Ibn al-Khattab who was killed by the FSB in 2002.

Moscow bombings

Volgodonsk bombing
  • Timur Batchayev (Ethnic Karachai,[16] killed in Georgia in the clash with police during which Krymshakhalov was arrested[9])
  • Zaur Batchayev (Ethnic Karachai[17] killed in Chechnya in 1999-2000[9])
  • Adam Dekkushev (Ethnic Karachai,[18] arrested in Georgia, threw a grenade at police during the arrest, extradited to Russia and sentenced to life imprisonment in January 2004, after a two-month closed trial held without a jury[1][14])

Buinaksk bombing
  • Isa Zainutdinov (Ethnic Avar[16] and native of Dagestan,[18] sentenced to life imprisonment in March 2001[19])
  • Alisultan Salikhov (Ethnic Avar[16] and native of Dagestan,[18] sentenced to life imprisonment in March 2001[19])
  • Magomed Salikhov (Ethnic Avar[16] and native of Dagestan,[20] arrested in Azerbaijan in November 2004, extradited to Russia, found not guilty on the charge of terrorism by the jury on January 24, 2006; found guilty of participating in an illegal armed force and illegal crossing of the national border,;[21] he was retried second time, and on November 13, 2006, found again not guilty, this time on all charges, including the ones he was found guilty of in the first trial.[22] According to Kommersant Salikhov admitted that he made a delivery of paint for terrorist Ibn al-Khattab, although he did not check if that really was a paint.[23])
  • Ziyavudin Ziyavudinov (Native of Dagestan,[24] arrested in Kazakhstan, extradited to Russia, sentenced to 24 years in April 2002[25])
  • Abdulkadyr Abdulkadyrov (Ethnic Avar[16] and native of Dagestan, sentenced to 9 years in March 2001[19])
  • Magomed Magomedov (Sentenced to 9 years in March 2001[19])
  • Zainutdin Zainutdinov (Ethnic Avar[16] and native of Dagestan, sentenced to 3 years in March 2001 and immediately released under amnesty[19])
  • Makhach Abdulsamedov (Native of Dagestan, sentenced to 3 years in March 2001 and immediately released under amnesty[19]).

FSB and GRU suspects

The suspicious events led to allegations that the bombings were in fact a "false flag" attack perpetrated by the FSB in order to legitimize the resumption of military activities in Chechnya and bring Vladimir Putin and the FSB to power. This theory is promoted in books by David Satter,[26][27] Yuri Felshtinsky and Vladimir Pribylovsky.[28] It was also supported by Alexander Litvinenko and Anna Politkovskaya, who were assassinated.[29] According to them, the following suspects have been involved:[28]

  • Future Russian president Vladimir Putin who was leading the chain of command according to the book by Felshinsky and Pribylovsky.
  • Director of Russian FSB agency Nikolai Patrushev
  • FSB General German Ugryumov who allegedly supervised the attacks. At the time, he was one of the lead figures in the FSB's counterterrorism section.[30][31]
  • Maxim Lazovsky, an FSB officer who was also involved in staging of bombings in Moscow in 1994.
  • Yusuf Krymshamkhalov and Adam Dekkushev, two official convicts who were hired by FSB agents provocateurs and who organized transportation of explosives to Moscow according to both versions
  • FSB officers Vladimir Romanovich and Ramazan Dyshenkov who carried out the apartment bombings in Moscow according to this version
  • Three FSB agents (two men and a woman) who conducted the "training exercise" in the city of Ryazan. Their identities and fate remains unknown although their photos were shown on Russian television.

Aleksey Galkin, a GRU officer, was captured and tortured by Chechen separatists in 1999. In a video statement the captors coerced him to make, he said that a team of twelve GRU operatives conducted bombings in the city of Buynaksk under general command of Leutenatnt General Kostechko.

References
  1. Alex Goldfarb, with Marina Litvinenko Death of a Dissident: The Poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko and the Return of the KGB, The Free Press, 2007, ISBN 1-4165-5165-4
  2. Russian Federation: Amnesty International's concerns and recommendations in the case of Mikhail Trepashkin - Amnesty International Archived 2009-09-10 at the Wayback Machine
  3. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2012-02-29. Retrieved 2012-01-29.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  4. Радиостанция "Эхо Москвы" / Передачи / Интервью / Четверг, 25.07.2002: Сергей Ковалев Archived 2012-02-16 at the Wayback Machine
  5. ACHIMEZ GOCHIYAYEV: RUSSIA’S TERRORIST ENIGMA RETURNS Archived 2007-09-30 at the Wayback Machine
  6. Gochiyayev's wanted page Archived 2005-03-18 at the Wayback Machine on FSB web site.
  7. Russia: Grasping the Reality of Nuclear Terror
  8. Putin’s defense sector appointees
  9. Only one explosions suspect still free Archived 2012-12-21 at Archive.today, Kommersant, December 10, 2002.
  10. Karachayev terrorists found in the morgue, Kommersant, June 8, 2004.
  11. Процесс о взрывах жилых домов: адвокат Адама Деккушева просит его полного оправдания
  12. Court starts hearings into 'hexogen case'
  13. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2012-02-16. Retrieved 2012-01-29.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) Separatists Tied to '99 Bombings.
  14. Two life sentences for 246 murders Archived 2010-10-29 at the Wayback Machine, Kommersant, January 13, 2004.
  15. A terrorist has imprisoned a policeman, Kommersant, May 15, 2003.
  16. ПРИЧАСТНЫЕ К ВЗРЫВАМ В МОСКВЕ УСТАНОВЛЕНЫ Archived 2006-10-04 at the Wayback Machine
  17. NEWS FROM RUSSIA",Vol.VI, Issue No.18, dated 1st May 2003 Archived 2007-08-23 at the Wayback Machine
  18. Disrupting Escalation of Terror in Russia to Prevent Catastrophic Attacks
  19. Buinaksk terrorists sentenced to life, Kommersant, March 20, 2001.
  20. Suspect in 1999 Buinaksk bombing brought to Russia
  21. Jury acquitted a Buinaksk suspect, Lenta.Ru, 2006 Jan 24.
  22. Jury acquitted a Buinaksk suspect again, Lenta.Ru, 2006 November 13.
  23. Khattab said: Your task is small Archived 2007-11-05 at the Wayback Machine, Kommersant, November 13, 2006.
  24. One More Participant of Terrorist Act in Buinaksk, Dagestan, Detained in Almaty, Republic of Kazakhstan Archived 2012-03-18 at the Wayback Machine
  25. They should be blown up, not put on trial, Kommersant, April 10, 2002.
  26. David Satter - House committee on Foreign Affairs Archived 2011-09-27 at the Wayback Machine
  27. David Satter. Darkness at Dawn: The Rise of the Russian Criminal State. Yale University Press. 2003. ISBN 0-300-09892-8.
  28. Vladimir Pribylovsky and Yuri Felshtinsky) The Age of Assassins. The Rise and Rise of Vladimir Putin, Gibson Square Books, London, 2008, ISBN 1-906142-07-6;
  29. Tegenlicht documentary VPRO 2007, In Memoriam Aleksander Litvinenko, Jos de Putter, Moscow 2004 Interview with Anna Politkovskaya.
  30. Адмирал ФСБ - Дух воинский - Православное воинство - РУССКОЕ ВОСКРЕСЕНИЕ; ?>
  31. Johnson's Russia List #5054 - January 27, 2001 Archived February 14, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
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