DISINFO: Ukrainian special services recruited Islamists to carry out a terrorist attack in Crocus City
SUMMARY
The last circumstance answers the main question - who is behind all this [terrorist attack]. The attempt to escape through the most guarded and closed part of the Russian border, where there are not only border guards, but also troops along with the National Guard, cannot be explained in any other way. The terrorists were expected there.
For the Ukrainian Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense there is no difficulty in reaching out to Islamists and finding those willing to carry out a terrorist attack for money.
In the same way, people who pour green dye into ballot boxes and throw Molotov cocktails at the windows of polling stations are not liberals at all. It’s just that the Ukrainian special services managed to find an approach to both.
RESPONSE
Pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative depicting Ukraine as a terrorist regime. The claim was made in connection with the Crocus City Hall terrorist attack outside Moscow on 22 March 2024. By trying to link the Crocus terrorist attack to Ukraine, pro-Kremlin media are trying to stoke support and gain legitimacy for its ongoing illegal invasion of Ukraine.
This is an unsubstantiated claim. There is no evidence of Ukrainian involvement in the Crocus City Hall terrorist attack.
Kyiv strongly denied any involvement in the assault on the Crocus City Hall music venue in Krasnogorsk, and the Islamic State group has claimed responsibility.
US officials have intelligence that the Islamic State group's Afghan affiliate IS-Khorasan is responsible for the Moscow attack. “ISIS bears sole responsibility for this attack. There was no Ukrainian involvement whatsoever,” White House National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a statement.
The US was legally obliged to warn Moscow earlier this month of a possible attack in Russia aimed at large gatherings before issuing a public advisory to citizens in the country. As explained by ABC news.
"The United States shared those advance intelligence indications under a tenet of the U.S. intelligence community called the “duty to warn," which obliges U.S. intelligence officials to lean toward sharing knowledge of a dire threat if conditions allow. That holds whether the targets are allies, adversaries or somewhere in between".
The alert was dismissed as "provocative", "blackmail" and an "attempt to intimidate, destabilise our country" by Putin. He said: “I’ll remind you of recent, let’s say directly, provocative statements of certain official Western structures about potential terror attacks in Russia. All of this looks like obvious blackmail and an attempt to intimidate, destabilise our country”.
In a recent development, news have appeared that Iran had warned Moscow a few days before of an imminent attack by ISIS based on information obtained from arrested ISIS terrorists in Iran.
Even Putin himself acknowledged late on 25 March that Islamists were committing the attack.
For background, read our analysis: The “Russophobia” Myth: Appealing to the Lowest Feelings.
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