MOSCOW – A 28-year-old computer science teacher has been identified by her family as the second of two female suicide bombers who killed dozens of people on the Moscow metro a week ago, a newspaper reported yesterday.
Rasul Magomedov recognised his missing daughter Maryam after being shown photos of the remains of the unidentified suicide bomber, the novayagazeta.ru website said.
More than 50 people have been killed in suicide attacks in Russia over the past week, both in the Moscow metro by bombers who Russian media have dubbed “black widows”, and in a town in the turbulent North Caucasus region of Dagestan.
Fears of a new bombing campaign against the Russian heartland increased yesterday after a double bomb attack on a railway line which security forces said was linked to the earlier attacks.
“My wife and I immediately recognised our daughter Maryam. When my wife last saw our daughter she was wearing the same red scarf we saw in the pictures,” Mr Magomedov, a teacher from the village of Balakhany in Dagestan, told Novaya Gazeta.
Mr Magomedov said his daughter graduated with a degree in maths and psychology from Dagestan Pedagogical University in 2005. She returned to her village, lived at home and taught computer science at a local school.
“I would really like the investigation to uncover the true picture of what happened. We cannot even suggest how Maryam could get to Moscow. Yes, she was religious. But she never expressed any radical beliefs,” he said.
Mr Magomedov said his daughter had denied to him allegations from security forces that she had links to insurgents in the region, or had married a local separatist leader. The family came under security force scrutiny two years ago when a brother of Maryam’s was charged with belonging to an armed group and was allegedly tortured in custody before most charges were dropped.
Photographs of a second young woman, obtained by Reuters from a law-enforcement official in Dagestan, showed her dressed in a black hijab and holding a grenade. Another photograph showed her holding a pistol.
She was named on Friday as Dagestani-born Dzhennet Abdurakhmanova, the widow of 30-year-old Umalat Magomedov, a prominent insurgent killed by Russian forces on December 31st, according to sources. – (Reuters)