The Crocus City Hall near Moscow, burnt out after an Islamic State mass killing, March 23, 2024 (Stringer/AFP/Getty)

EA-Times Radio Special: How Ukraine Threatens Putin’s Election “Win”

Saturday’s Coverage: 133+ Killed in Moscow Attack Claimed by ISIS

Map: Institute for the Study of War

UPDATE 1721 GMT:

Polish and NATO F-16s were activated when a Russian cruise missile crossed Poland’s airspace during overnight attacks on Ukraine.

Polish Defense Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz said the missile would have been shot down if there was any indication that it was heading towards a target in Poland.

“As last night’s rocket attack on Ukraine was one of the most intense since the beginning of the Russian aggression, all the strategic procedures were launched on time and the object was monitored until it left the Polish airspace,” Kosiniak-Kamysz said.

UPDATE 1447 GMT:

The death toll from Friday’s attack on the Crocus City concert hall near Moscow has risen to 137.

UPDATE 1410 GMT:

Speaking with the independent Russian website Meduza, a “State media employee” has confirmed Russian State and pro-regime media have been instructed by the Kremlin to emphasize possible “traces” of Ukrainian involvement in any reporting on Friday’s attack on the Crocus City concert hall.

A second source from a pro-Kremlin outlet confirmed the report.

UPDATE 1051 GMT:

Falling debris from an overnight Russian drone attack has damaged heating networks and power lines in Kryvyi Rih in central Ukraine.

Dnipropetrovsk Governor Serhii Lysak said six hospitals, more than 150 schools, and 3,000 houses remained without heat after a “voltage drop” left several boiler plants disconnected.

Thousands of people in the Nikopol area were without electricity after debris of a downed drone damaged an energy facility, but power has now been restored.

UPDATE 1043 GMT:

Poland’s Foreign Ministry is demanding explanations from Russia over “another violation of the country’s airspace” during overnight Russian strikes on western Ukraine (see 0556 GMT).

One of about 20 cruise missiles fired on the Lviv region briefly crossed over Polish territory.

Warsaw called on Moscow to “stop terrorist air attacks on the inhabitants and territory of Ukraine”.

UPDATE 1038 GMT:

The Ukraine military says it struck two large Russian landing ships, several infrastructure facilities, and a communications center used by Russia’s Black Sea Fleet late Saturday.

The strikes were on Sevastopol, the headquarters of the Fleet in Russian-occupied Crimea (see 0630 GMT).

UPDATE 0630 GMT:

Ukrainian forces carried out aerial attacks on Sevastopol in Russian-occupied Crimea late Saturday.

Unverified claims are circulating of strikes on positions of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.

Sevastopol Governor Mikhail Razvozhayev declared, “more than 10 missiles have been shot down.”

UPDATE 0608 GMT:

In a video circulating on Russian social media channels, Russia’s security forces have cut off part of the ear of one of the four alleged Islamic State attackers of the Crocus City concert hall.

The Russian officers then trysecon to force the ear down the suspect’s throat.

The suspect is lying on the floor with his hands tied, his head bloodied, and part of his right ear missing. An officer puts the severed ear in the man’s mouth. When the detainee spits it out, the officer punches him in the face.

A Russian Neo-Nazi posted that one of his followers cut off the suspect’s ear. The knife is now up for auction.

UPDATE 0556 GMT:

The Kyiv Military Administration says air defenses downed about 10 Russian missiles fired on Ukraine’s capital early Sunday.

The Kh-101/Kh-555/Kh-55 cruise missiles were launched by Tu-95MS strategic bombers from the Engels airbase in the Saratov region in southwest Russia.

The Russians fired about 20 missiles and seven Iran-type attack drones on Lviv in western Ukraine, said Mayor Andriy Sadovyi.

Sadovyi said critical infrastructure was targeted, but no damage has been reported from Lviv city.

ORIGINAL ENTRY: Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has called Vladimir Putin a “low-life” for lying about Friday’s attack on a concert venue near Moscow that killed at least 133 people, inclulding three children.

The Islamic State has repeatedly claimed responsibility for the mass shooting and detonation of explosives that started a fire and partially collapsed the roof of the Crocus City Hall, about 20 km (12.5 miles) northwest of Red Square.

On Saturday night ISIS released a 91-second video of the attack on its Telegram channels. It shows a close-up of one of the four attackers opening fire on several people as he enters the concert hall.

But Putin used a 5 1/2-minute video address to claim that the four gunmen were apprehended as they were trying to cross the Russian-Ukraine border, with the assistance of Ukrainian officials.

In his nightly address to the nation, Zelenskiy said, “What happened yesterday in Moscow is obvious: Putin and the other scum are just trying to blame it on someone else … They always have the same methods.”

They came to Ukraine, burned down our cities, and then tried to blame Ukraine. They torture and rape people — and then blame them. They have brought hundreds of thousands of their terrorists to Ukrainian territory, and they are waging war against us, but they don’t care about what happens inside their own country.

All of this happened yesterday, and instead of taking care of his Russian citizens and addressing them, this duffer Putin remained silent for a day, thinking about how to link this to Ukraine.

US officials have said that their intelligence points to ISIS as the perpetrator of the attack, having shared information with the Kremlin since March 7 about the possibility. National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson reiterated on Saturday that there was no Ukrainian involvement “whatsoever”.

Russian State TV broadcast footage of the detention and questioning of the four suspects, saying they were all foreign nationals who were captured in the Bryansk region near the Ukraine border. However, neither Putin nor any Russian official responded to the Islamic State’s claims of responsibility.