Rebel Sentenced to 15 Years for Plotting Red Square Bombing

The St. Petersburg Times

Published: November 29, 2012 (Issue # 1737)

The Moscow City Court on Wednesday handed a 15-year prison sentence to a Caucasus rebel who planned two suicide bombings on Red Square on New Year's Eve two years ago.

The court convicted Ilyas Saidov of multiple charges, including racketeering, terrorism, attempting to detonate explosives, assaulting a police officer, murder, and illegal dissemination of weapons and explosives, the Prosecutor General's Office said in a statement. Saidov committed the crimes as part of an organized criminal group, prosecutors said.

The verdict said Saidov brought two explosive devices to Moscow on a bus from Makhachkala, the capital of the Dagestan republic, in order to pass them to female suicide bombers who were supposed to detonate them on Red Square on the night of Dec. 31, 2010.

One of the suicide bombers died when the explosives detonated in her room several hours before the planned attack. The other one, Zeinap Suyunova, and another associate, Timur Akubekov, were sentenced to 10 years in jail each by the same court in May 2012.

The court determined that in Dagestan in 2010, Saidov joined a criminal gang led by Ibragimkhalil Daudov. The group's activities were aimed at winning independence from Russia for the North Caucasus republics, prosecutors said.

Saidov was also convicted of carrying out with his associates three bombings, two attempts on the lives of policemen and military officers, several murders of civilians and three bombing attempts. He was also found guilty of illegal possession of weapons and explosives.