The US embassy in Russia warned its citizens two weeks ago that “extremists (had) imminent plans to target large gatherings in Moscow, including concerts”, a White House official said on Saturday March 23 , the day after the attack which targeted a concert hall in the suburbs of Moscow. The attack, claimed by the jihadist group Islamic State, left at least 133 dead, according to a report from investigators given on Saturday afternoon.
Deputy National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said the United States had shared this intelligence with Russian authorities. The government of American President Joe Biden has thus, according to her, applied a long-standing policy of “duty to alert”, under which the United States warns targeted countries when they receive information on specific threats of kidnappings or assassinations.
According to information from New York Times, the United States gathered intelligence in March that the Islamic State of Khorasan, known as ISIS-K, the group’s Afghanistan-based branch, was planning an attack on Moscow. “ISIS-K has been obsessed with Russia for two years,” Colin Clarke, a counterterrorism analyst at the Soufan Group, a New York-based security consulting firm, told the American newspaper. “ISIS-K accuses the Kremlin of having Muslim blood on its hands, referring to Moscow’s interventions in Afghanistan, Chechnya and Syria,” he continued.