Bomb blast hits Russian city
It’s very early, but the news is already bad. A large blast has hit a market in Vladikavkaz, the biggest of the North Caucasus towns – the fiery underbelly of Russia.
ITAR-TASS, the Russian news agency, says the bomb was big. Interfax has people at the scene, uttering the saddening words in Russian: yest postradavshix. There are casualties.
In a crowded market, in a partially Muslim area the day before Eid, the numbers could be bad.
Vladikavkaz has been hit before, but the spectre of Islamic extremism – which I have presumptively decided to address here as a possible cause – was been wavering in the North Causasus.
There was a recent blast on the Moscow metro, yes, but the cell behind that was – Russia’s security services claimed with their hallmark certainty – neutralised. They seemed unable to follow the attack up, in the usual chilling style of three or four successive hits.
The main worry here is that Russia has pretty much played all its cards in this impoverished, angry, heavily repressed region. It’s installed a loyal Chechen – Ramzan Kadyrov – to be its ruthless proxy. It’s tried successive campaigns of murder and repression. But still the insurgency lives on, and spreads across the region.
Moscow will be hoping – for less than humane reasons – that the casualties from this blast are low. Smaller messes are easier to sweep under the carpet.
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