Chechen Militant Claims Moscow Subway Blasts

(April 1) -- A top Chechen rebel leader has posted a chilling Web video statement claiming responsibility for sending suicide bombers onto the Moscow subway in attacks that killed 39 commuters earlier this week.

In the clip, Doku Umarov also threatened more attacks to avenge what he called atrocities ordered by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in the country's volatile North Caucasus region -- an area where Muslim separatists have waged a nearly 20-year insurgency against Russian control.

"You Russians only see the war on television and hear about it on the radio, and this is why you are quiet and do not react to the atrocities that your bandit groups under Putin's command carry out in the Caucasus," Umarov said in the 4.5-minute video. "I promise you that the war will come to your streets, and you will feel it in your lives and under your skin."

The statement was posted on a pro-rebel Web site late Wednesday, just hours after another double suicide bombing killed at least 12 people -- mostly Russian law enforcement officials -- in Dagestan, another area of the North Caucasus near Chechnya. Early this morning, two more people were killed in Dagestan when a car packed with explosives blew up, local media reported.

"All these are links of the same chain, all this is the manifestation of the same terrorist activity which has recently started to resurface in the Caucasus," President Dmitry Medvedev told Russia's security council Wednesday. "I don't rule out that this is one and the same gang," Putin also said.

On Monday, investigators believe that two female suicide bombers strode onto a busy Moscow subway line during the morning rush hour and exploded themselves as the train doors were just opening, in brazen attacks that killed at least 39 people and wounded scores of commuters. It was the worst attack on Russia's capital in six years, hitting Muscovites close to home after a lull in which they began to feel insulated from violence raging in Russia's mainly Muslim southeast corner.

The 45-year-old Umarov, dressed in military camouflage and sitting cross-legged in what appears to be a forest clearing, said he ordered Monday's attacks to retaliate for an anti-terrorism raid by Russian security forces back in February. At least 20 people were killed in the operation, and Umarov accused officers of using knives to execute innocent, impoverished villagers.

This is the first official claim of responsibility for Monday's bombings, though Russian officials quickly blamed Muslim militants from the North Caucasus. They did not name Umarov publicly, but Putin vowed to "drag out of the sewer" those responsible.

In his video, Umarov said he could only grin when accused of terrorism because he has not heard people condemn Putin for similar crimes. Russian leaders "send their gangs to the Caucasus and support their security services that carry out massacres," he said.

There's been no public response from Putin since Umarov's video hit the Internet late Wednesday. But Chechnya's representative in Russia's parliament, Ziyad Sabsabi, dismissed Umarov's threats. "It doesn't matter that he has claimed responsibility for those bestial murders," Sabsabi told the Interfax news agency. "In any case, his days are numbered."

Russian forces have tried for years to capture or kill Umarov, who declared jihad in 2007 to establish an Islamic emirate in the Caucasus ruled by Muslim sharia law. Despite two brutal wars against Chechen separatists like Umarov, the Kremlin has been unable to halt a simmering insurgency in the mainly Muslim region.

The area has seen increased attacks in recent months, with almost daily clashes between Russian security forces and rebel fighters. Police have killed several high-profile militant leaders during that time, including one known for training suicide bombers.

A report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies said 916 people died in the North Caucasus in 2009 in violence related to the clashes, up from 586 in 2008. Another monitoring group, the Caucasian Knot, reported the region had 172 terrorist attacks last year, killing 280 people in Chechnya, 319 in Ingushetia and 263 in Dagestan.

It's unclear how much power Umarov wields over militants across the North Caucasus, of which Chechnya is part. Analysts say small groups of insurgents are loosely connected but largely operate independently, without overall coordination.