WarningsThe US embassy had said two weeks before the attack that there was a risk of “extremists” targeting mass gatherings in Moscow, including concerts.”If the United States had reliable information on this, it should have immediately transmitted it,” said Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, calling Friday’s attack a “monstrous crime”.Russian authorities had announced on March 3 that six suspected Islamic State fighters had been killed in an operation in Ingushetia, a small Muslim-majority republic in the Caucasus region.Russia has been the target of past attacks by Islamic militants, but also mass killings with no clear political link.In 2002, Chechen separatist fighters took 912 people hostage in a Moscow theatre, the Dubrovka, demanding the withdrawal of Russian troops from the Caucasus republic.Special forces attacked the theatre to end the hostage-taking and 130 people were killed, nearly all suffocated by a gas used by security forces to knock out the gunmen.
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