Fram gazeta.ru/ Can't vouch for its accuracy, but it seems to fit with the pattern. Note the dislocation from reality that is typical of Wahabbis: Bombings in Muslim regions are hardly likely to tuen Muslim sentiment pro-Wahabbi. My girlfriend was a few hundred meters from bomb BTW.
Arab mercenary paid $4.5m for Moscow metro blast
Текст: Yelena Neglinina Фото: www.kavkazcenter.com
Russia has evidence that this month's terrorist attack on the Moscow metro was organised by Arab mercenary Abu al-Valid who is believed to have succeeded the notorious Khattab, eliminated by special services in 2002. According to intelligence reports, Al-Valid was paid $4.5 million for the attack and has already left Chechnya for one of the Persian Gulf states.
That information was reported on condition of anonymity by representatives of Russia s special services. Security agents first suggested Abu al-Valid might be involved in the attack several days after the explosion, though no evidence substantiating those assertions had been available.
Today s statement by Interfax s anonymous source confirmed earlier assumptions of Al-Valid s possible implication in organising the attack. ''According to our data, Arab mercenary Abu al-Valid, one of the leaders of Chechnya s bandit formations, has had $4.5 million transferred into his personal foreign account for preparing and perpetrating the act of terrorism in the Moscow metro on 6 February,'' an unnamed source in the special services told the news agency.
The fact that Khattab s successor left Chechnya shortly after the blast may implicitly prove that he organised the attack and received remuneration. When and how he departed from the republic remains unclear but Russian security agents are convinced that the Arab terrorist is currently hiding in one of the Persian Gulf states.
Relatively little is known of Abu al-Valid. The Saudi-born rebel began his career in Chechnya as an aide to the notorious rebel leader Khattab. In April 2002 when Khattab was poisoned, Chechen field commanders named al-Valid commander of all the foreign mercenaries fighting on the rebel side in Chechnya. Also after Khattab s death Al-Valid took charge of all the financial resources received by the rebels from their sponsors abroad.
Russian special services have reported him killed six times, but each time those reports had to be refuted after the mercenary leader re-surfaced in the republic, alive and well. In November of last year the FSB offered a $100,000 reward for any information leading to the location and extermination of the elusive Arab.
The metro explosion was the first terrorist act perpetrated outside the Northern Caucasus to be blamed on Abu al-Valid. The secret service suspected earlier that the October 2002 raid on the Nord-Ost theatre in Moscow and the December 2002 attack on the government compound in Grozny were the work of Abu al-Valid, albeit the responsibility was taken by Arab militants using Shamil Basayev s name as a symbol of Chechen separatism.
It has been established that by organizing terrorist acts Al-Valid used suicide bombers, mostly women. In particular, suicide bombers carried out attacks on a government compound in Znamenskoye, at a religious festival in Iliskhan-Yurt, where a bomber blew herself up in the presence of Akhmad Kadyrov, and on a bus carrying troops to Mozdok. An explosion that tore though a Victory Day parade on 9 May 2002 in the Dagestani port of Kaspiisk, too, was ascribed to Al-Valid, who organized the attack with the help of his aide, Rappani Khalilov.
In a TV broadcast ran by Al-Jazeera in November of last year a man, introduced as Abu al-Valid, pledged to continue terror attacks in Russia, specifying, however, that those attacks would be aimed at military targets in Russia s Muslim regions.
If Al-Valid has indeed fled, separatist leaders Shamil Basayev and Aslan Maskhadov may follow his example shortly. Without regular financing from abroad rebel leaders will find it harder to continue active resistance to federal troops. Judging by special service reports they have not received any financing for three months now. 19 ФЕВРАЛЯ 17:27