Islamist insurgent leader Doku Umarov threatened more attacks on major targets across Russia in a video released on Friday, six weeks after a suicide bomber killed 37 people at Russia's busiest airport.
Islamist insurgent leader Doku Umarov on Friday threatened more attacks on major targets across Russia in a video released on Friday, six weeks after a suicide bomber killed 37 people at Russia's busiest airport.
"These strikes on strategic facilities will continue. Every person must know that war is war," the Chechen-born rebel said in Russian in an 11-minute video, the third he has posted on insurgency-affiliated site kavkazcenter.com in two days.
A decade after federal forces drove separatists out of power in the second war in Chechnya, the Kremlin is struggling to contain an Islamist insurgency throughout the North Caucasus, where militants want to create a separate Islamic state.
Umarov, who has said he was behind the January 24 suicide bombing at Moscow's Domodedovo airport, said the "Caucasus mujahideen" have not been discouraged by the recent arrests of the brother and sister of the airport bomber.
"Let Russia know it is in a state of war with the Caucasus Muslims and that we are launching our response strikes precisely on strategic facilities," said Umarov, clad in camouflage and wagging his right index finger at the camera.
The airport bombing came 10 months after two female suicide bombers struck on the Moscow metro in March, killing 40 people in the first major attack in the capital in six years.
Sporting a long black beard, Umarov, 46, was filmed sitting with a Kalashnikov rifle propped upright in snow-covered woods. Styling himself as the Emir of the Caucasus, he is believed to be hiding on the wooded slopes of the Caucasus mountains.
The video by Russia's most wanted man follows two others posted on Thursday in which he called on Muslims across Russia to wage jihad (holy war), and urged Arabs to usher in radical Islam during the current unrest.
Despite billions of dollars Moscow pours into the North Caucasus, President Dmitry Medvedev has said violence is increasing and political analysts say Europe's largest Islamist insurgency is gaining size.
A poll conducted last month by state-run VTsIOM showed that 80 percent of Russians are afraid that they or a member of their family could become victims of "terrorist attacks", up from 61% two years ago.
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
)
)
)
)
)
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}
){kind=small}