SUICIDE BOMBER KILLS AT LEAST 37 ON TRAIN NEAR CHECHNYA
By Steven Lee Myers

December 5, 2003 – (NYT) A suicide bomber blew himself up inside a crowded commuter train in southern Russia today, killing at least 37 people in what President Vladimir V. Putin denounced as a terrorist act intended to disrupt parliamentary elections here this weekend.

The explosion, which occurred at 7:42 a.m., wrenched apart the second carriage of the train only moments after it left the station in Yessentuki, near the foothills of the Caucasus, not far from Chechnya.

The force of the bomb, which one official estimated to contain more than 20 pounds of plastic explosives, hurled bodies and body parts dozens of yards from the carriage. More than 100 other passengers, many of them students on their way to school in the resort city of Mineralniye Vodi, were wounded, some of them gravely. Officials warned that the death toll could rise higher.

It seemed unlikely that today's suicide attack would drastically affect the outcome of Sunday's elections, in which the party loyal to Mr. Putin, United Russia, is expected to win a comfortable majority.

"The crime committed today is of course an attempt to destabilize the situation in the country on the eve of the parliamentary elections," Mr. Putin said in remarks broadcast on national television. "I am sure the criminals will not succeed in this."

The bombing nevertheless underscored the bloody price that the smoldering conflict in Chechnya continues to exact on Russia, despite the Kremlin's efforts to write a new constitution and elect a new president in the battered republic.

There were cryptic and unconfirmed reports last week that one of Chechnya's most notorious rebel commanders, Shamil Basayev, had threatened to initiate a new wave of terrorist attacks leading up to Sunday's elections and the New Year holidays. In addition to the bombing, officials said they discovered a car loaded with explosives in Ingushetia, which borders Chechnya, foiling another potential attack.

While there was no immediate claim of responsibility for the bombing, Sergei N. Ignatchenko, chief spokesman for the Federal Security Service, said in an interview that it bore all the characteristics of terrorist acts by Chechnya's separatist fighters.

In the train's twisted wreckage, investigators found the body of a man believed to have been the suicide bomber, as well as grenades strapped to his legs and a bag believed to have carried the explosives, he said.

Nikolai P. Patrushev, the director of the security service, who appeared on television with Mr. Putin, said the bomber appeared to have worked with three accomplices, all women. Two of them, he said, are believed to have leapt from the train shortly before the explosion. A third, who he said might have detonated the explosive by remote control, was gravely wounded and not likely to survive.

Boris V. Gryzlov, Russia's interior minister and leader of United Russia, vowed to punish those responsible for the bombing.

"The earth will burn under their feet," he said, according to the Interfax news agency. "These animals will not feel safe anywhere."

Over the spring and summer Russia suffered a wave of terrorist attacks, many of them carried out by suicide bombers. The attacks — at a rock concert in Moscow, a bus stop and military hospital in Mozdok and government buildings in Chechnya — killed more than 250 people.
In recent months, however, the attacks appeared to wane. The last occurred in early September when a bomb exploded on a train on the same commuter line as today's attack, killing six people.

Officials have attributed the attacks — as well as the siege of a theater in Moscow last October that ended with the deaths of 129 hostages and 41 guerrillas — to Chechens aided by international Islamic extremists.

"The crime committed this morning also says that the international terrorism that has launched a challenge to many countries of the world continues to remain a serious threat today for our country as well," Mr. Putin said in his remarks today. "It is a cruel, cunning, dangerous enemy. First of all, it is the innocent people who suffer from its crimes."

In an interview at the Federal Security Service's headquarters on Lubyanka Square, Mr. Ignatchenko said that intelligence reports suggested that separatist fighters in Chechnya continued to receive financial support from abroad, including Islamic charities in Saudi Arabia. He cited evidence of a $3 million payment in March that may have bankrolled the wave of attacks over the summer.

He acknowledged the difficulty of tracing the organization of the bombings, saying many are planned and carried out locally. "It is hard to determine if a person who works as a cook or sells something in a market is a terrorist," he said. "At some point he gets a command."
While Mr. Ignatchenko said Russia had had recent success in fighting terrorism stemming from the wars in Chechnya, he warned of a new threat. After nearly a decade of conflict, including two wars and the destruction of the republic's economy, industry and schools, he said, "a new generation has grown in Chechnya that has not seen anything but war."

"Many cannot read," he added. "Many cannot speak Russian, but they know very well how to disassemble a Kalashnikov and how to set up a mine."

From: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/05/international/europe/06RUSSIA.html