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Moscow train accident believed to be terror attack
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-06-12 15:02
A passenger train travelling from the rebel republic of Chechnya to Moscow
derailed after an explosion, in what Russian officials said was an act of
terrorism that slightly injured dozens of people on board.
"This was a terrorist attack," Alexei Panteleyev, the deputy governor of the
Moscow region, was quoted as saying by RIA Novosti news agency hours after the
incident, which coincided with the annual national independence day holiday in
Russia.
There were no reported fatalities but five people were hospitalized with
injuries and 37 others sought medical attention after five cars jumped the
tracks near the town of Uzunovo about 150 kilometers (93 miles) southeast of
Moscow, according to Russian media reports.
Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks during
an awards ceremony in the Moscow Kremlin, Sunday, June 12,
2005.[AP] | None of the reported injuries was life-threatening.
Deputy Prosecutor General Nikolai Savchenko said an investigation had been
opened for suspected "terrorism and attempted murder of two or more people."
There was no claim of responsibility for the attack, and police said they were
searching the nearby area for the perpetrator.
Most of the injured were treated at the scene and released while the
remaining passengers boarded another train and continued their journey to
Moscow.
A spokeswoman for the FSB security service said the train's conductor
reported seeing an explosion on the tracks ahead of him seconds before the train
derailed.
Investigators also found evidence, including electric cables wired to one of
the rails and a location beside the tracks where the "supposed criminal" hid
before detonating the blast, indicating that the blast was set off deliberately,
she said.
The train was travelling at a slow speed when the derailment occurred and
Echo Moskvi radio said the conductor had time to apply the brakes after he saw
the explosion and before the cars jumped the tracks.
"It all happened very quickly," an unidentified elderly woman who was aboard
the train said in an interview with the NTV television network. "There was a
loud noise. I didn't know what was happening."
The blast had a force equivalent to three kilograms of TNT and left a crater
about one meter (three feet) wide on the path of the railway, officials said.
Investigators from several federal agencies including the FSB, the interior
ministry and the emergency situations ministry travelled to the scene and
Savchenko said they checked the surrounding area to verify that no other
explosive devices had been planted nearby.
The derailment came amid heightened fears that Chechen rebels may carry out
more attacks during the summer holiday season.
A senior law enforcement official said last Wednesday that security was being
stepped up at airports, train stations and other public sites under measures to
prevent acts of terrorism and other crimes during the summer.
Those measures included stationing of police officers with special training
in profiling criminal suspects based on behavioral and physical traits, First
Deputy Interior Minister Alexander Chekalin was quoted by ITAR-TASS news agency
as saying.
Russian troops have been fighting separatist rebel forces in Chechnya for the
past five and a half years, the second war Russia has fought in Chechnya in the
past decade.
Chechen rebels have in the past claimed responsibility for attacks on Russian
transport facilities, including the simultaneous downing last August of two
passenger jets followed a week later by a suicide bomb attack outside a busy
Moscow metro station.
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