At least three people were killed and 16 others were injured during attacks carried out today by unknown assailants against two Orthodox churches, a synagogue and a transit point in the cities of Derbent and Makhachkala, in the region of Dagestan, a predominantly Muslim Russian republic in the Caucasus, according to reported the regional department of the Ministry of the Interior.
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“Around 6:00 p.m. (3:00 p.m. GMT) in Derbent, unknown individuals shot a synagogue and a church with automatic weapons,” the agency said on its Telegram account.
Interior added that in Derbent, “one police officer died, another is injured.”
Russia’s National Anti-Terrorism Committee also reported that the Orthodox Church priest had died during the shooting and declared the alert “to ensure security, stop terrorist crimes and arrest those involved in the shooting.”
Interior also reported another attack carried out this Sunday in the city of Makhachkala, about 110 kilometers north of Derbent, where unknown persons fired at another church and a traffic checkpoint, killing a police officer and a temple guard, and wounding six others. policemen
Later the police increased the number of injured in both cities to 16 people.
In Derbent, the attackers fled in a white VW Polo car, while in Makhachkala, law enforcement officers and extremists exchanged gunfire.
According to authorities, two of the attackers died and two others were arrested.
Images of the Derbent synagogue engulfed in fire and dense columns of smoke were broadcast on Russian public television.
“The leader of Dagestan, Sergei Melikov, denounced that these attacks “are an attempt to destabilize the situation” in the republic, and called on the population via Telegram to remain calm.
“What these damned people want most is for panic to spread. The Dagestanis won’t give them the pleasure!” he pointed out.
The investigative directorate of the Investigative Committee in Dagestan opened criminal cases for terrorist attacks in connection with the attacks in both Dagestan cities.
The attacks on the churches were carried out on the same day that the Russian Orthodox celebrate Pentecost.
The previous attack on a church in this republic took place last February, when a gunman fired indiscriminately into a crowd of people celebrating the Russian festival of Masletnisa, a Carnival-like holiday that precedes the great Orthodox fast, and claimed four lives.
The attacker was killed by security forces, after which the Islamic State terrorist group assumed responsibility for the event without presenting evidence.
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