The suspects in the Moscow concert hall attack appeared in a Russian court on Monday with what appeared to be visible signs of torture.
Russia arrested the four Tajik men believed to be behind the shooting — Dalerdzhon Mirzoyev, 32; Saidakrami Rachabalizoda, 30; Shamsidin Fariduni, 25; and Mukhammadsobir Faizov, 19, all of whom pleaded guilty. The shooters were brought into court with visible signs of severe injury.
One suspect, Faizov, was wheeled in on a wheelchair-like device and appeared to be barely conscious. Another had a bandage over one ear, possibly corroborating social media footage leaked by security forces in which an officer appears to cut the suspect’s ear off and shove it in his mouth.
Another unverified photo published by a Wagner-affiliated Telegram channel showed one of the suspects with a Soviet field telephone wired to his genitals.
All the suspects had visible bruises on their faces. One had a ripped plastic bag over his head, indicating asphyxiation.
While being met with outrage from human rights activists, several Russian figures praised the treatment of the suspects.
Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said the suspects “deserve no mercy,” a sentiment elaborated on by former president and deputy chairman of the Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev.
“Well done to all those who caught them,” a post of his said on Telegram. “Should they be killed? They should be. And will be. But it’s much more important to kill everyone involved. Everyone. Those who paid, who sympathized with them, who helped them. Kill them all.”
The Crocus City Hall attack saw four gunmen enter the popular concert venue and shoot people at random. ISIS-K-affiliated media posted videos of the attackers shouting Islamic extremist slogans. So far, nearly 140 people have been killed, with the total expected to rise. Four suspects were captured by security forces while on their way to Ukraine, according to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The Kremlin had been hesitant to fully blame the attack on ISIS-K, with Putin only first asserting on Monday that the attack was carried out by “Islamic extremists.” The Russian president continued to claim that the attackers had a link to Ukraine, with the only evidence being the apparent effort of the terrorists to travel in the direction of the Ukrainian border.
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Ukraine has vehemently denied involvement, with the United States backing up their denials.
Russia has long been a target of Islamic terrorism, stemming from the first Chechen War in 1994 and reinvigorated by Russia’s war against ISIS in Syria. Friday’s attack was the deadliest terrorist attack in Russia since the 2004 Beslan school siege, which resulted in the deaths of over 300 civilians, most of them schoolchildren.
