News / Russia

FSB arrests suspected Daesh-linked terrorists planning attacks

Thursday, 29 December 2016 3:34 PM [ Last Update: Thursday, 29 December 2016 4:20 PM ]

Russian Special forces soldiers block an area as they raided an apartment building in Saint Petersburg in an operation targeting North Caucasus militants, on August 17, 2016. (Photo by AFP)

Russia’s domestic security agency says its forces have taken into custody several suspected Daesh-linked terrorists, who were planning to carry out terror attacks around the capital, Moscow.

The Federal Security Service (FSB) said on Thursday that its forces had arrested seven suspects in the North Caucasus province of Dagestan.

The FSB said the suspects had been preparing to carry out terrorist attacks using automatic weapons and explosive devices in crowded places of Moscow during New Year holidays.

They were plotting “a series of high-profile terrorist actions” in the Moscow region on the direct orders of a senior Daesh commander in Syria.

This is the latest in a series of counterterrorism operations by Russian security forces which have foiled potential terrorist attacks in the capital as well as Saint Petersburg

Dagestan terrorists have a record of carrying out such attacks on Russian police forces and government officials.

Russian Special forces soldiers leave a flat as they raided an apartment building in Saint Petersburg in an operation targeting North Caucasus militants, on August 17, 2016. (Photo by AFP)

Some of the extremist militants in the restive North Caucasus region have sworn allegiance to Daesh, mainly active in Iraq and Syria.

The Dagestan region and neighboring ex-Soviet Chechnya have been major breeding ground for Takfiri terrorists who travel to Syria and Iraq to join the ranks of Daesh and other terrorist groups.

Russian officials say thousands of citizens of Russia and other ex-Soviet countries have joined the ranks of Daesh.

For its part, Daesh claimed it had established a Vilayat Kavkaz militants' state in Russia.

FSB led a special operation in Talgi, near the southern city of Makhachkala in early December, killing the leader of the Kavkaz franchise, Rustam Aselderov, and several others.

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