Chechen militant claims to have ordered Moscow airport attack

Feb 8, 2011, 1:52 GMT

Moscow - Chechenya's top terrorism suspect, Doku Umarov, claimed in a video clip posted late Monday on the internet to have ordered last month's suicide bombing at Moscow's Domododevo airport.

Already declared public enemy number one by Russian officials, Umarov threatened further attacks in the video, which was posted on kavkazcenter.com. He said the airport attack was carried out to avenge 'Russian crimes in the Caucasus.'

In another video posted a day earlier on the same website, he had implied a connection to the January 24 bombing, in which 37 people were killed.

Umarov, who has been dubbed 'Russia's Bin Laden,' has made previous claims of responsibility through the same website for other deadly attacks on Russian civilian targets.

According to Russian Moscow media reports last week, investigators believe the suicide bomber at Domododevo was a 20-year-old man from the North Caucasus republic of Ingushetia.

In the Muslim-dominated republics of Ingushetia, Chechnya and Dagestan, numerous Islamist militant groups have been fighting for an independent 'emirate' in the North Caucasus. Umarov calls himself 'Emir of the Caucasus.'

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