Russian law enforcement have reportedly made arrests for suspects in the Crocus concert hall massacre in Moscow.
They also revealed pictures and names of four suspects. The toll rose to 93 people, including three children.
Some 121 victims – including children – were in hospital, as Muscovites queued to donate blood. In all 183 were wounded, including eight children.
Eleven people have been detained after the attack, the head of Russia’s Federal Security Service told President Vladimir Putin on Saturday, according to Russian state news agency Tass.
It comes after a white Renault with Tver region license plates with the alleged terrorists was stopped near the village of Teply, close to the borders with Belarus and Ukraine, according to Baza media.
Russian media share pictures of four suspected terrorists, in the Crocus concert hall massacre in Moscow, giving their names as (clockwise from the left) Makhmadrasul Nasridinov, 27, Rivozhidin Ismonov, 51, Shokhindzhonn Safolzoda, 21, Rustam Nazarov, 29
Some Moscow media suggested the terrorists could have escaped in this white Renault car with a number plate from Russian Tver region
The burn out remains of the Crocus City Hall concert hall can be seen this morning following last night’s massacre
The aftermath of the devastating attack inside the concert hall shows broken glass covering the floor as Russian investigators examine the scene
A Kalashnikov assault rifle lies on the ground as Russian investigators work inside Crocus City Hall concert venue following a terrorist attack in Krasnogorsk
Russian investigators work inside Crocus City Hall concert venue following the terrorist attack
Russian investigators examine ammunition inside Crocus City Hall concert
Russian national tricolor flag flutters in the wind near the burned Crocus City Hall concert hall
A panel can be seen falling off the wall inside the burned Crocus City Hall
Russian rescue services members work inside burned Crocus City Hall concert venue following the terrorist attack
According to preliminary data, there were six people in the car, and two were detained. Four more managed to escape.
Baza – with close law enforcement contacts – showed images of four suspects, all from ex-Soviet republic Tajikistan, which borders Afghanistan.
They were Makhmadrasul Nasridinov, 37, Rivozhidin Ismonov, 51, Shohinjonn Safolzoda, 21 and Rustam Nazarov, 29.
It is unclear which of these four have been detained.
Russian FSB security service officers were ‘working with’ the suspects who were detained. ‘They are being checked for involvement in the terrorist attack,’ reported Baza.
Telegram channel VChK-OGPU said earlier that one detainee from Tajikistan had named three others who he was with in a car.
‘These are also natives of Tajikistan. They managed to hide in the forest.
‘Now that it is light, an active search is underway for them. However, there is no confirmation yet that these people were the terrorists who attacked Crocus.’
One witness said: ‘We huddled in a corner at the entrance. He [gunman] came up and started shooting directly at people. They had black hair.
‘They were shouting at each other and it was not Russian speech.’
Image of the suspected gunmen who opened fire at Crocus City Hall, in Krasnogorsk, Moscow
A nationwide manhunt has been launched for the individuals (pictured) thought to be responsible for the terror attack
A view shows the burning Crocus City Hall concert hall following the shooting incident in Krasnogorsk, outside Moscow
A massive blaze is seen over the Crocus City Hall on the western edge of Moscow, Russia, on Friday, March 22
The large venue was engulfed in flames after at least five armed men in camouflage stormed the hall (Pictured: Emergency services at the scene)
An picture from the scene last night shows the Crocus City Hall concert hall engulfed in flames as the venue is surrounded by emergency service crews
A map showing the location of the Crocus City Hall, which is situated 12 miles from the Kremlin in central Moscow
Ukraine has vehemently denied any role in the bloodbath at Crocus City Hall.
‘We categorically reject accusations of Ukraine’s alleged involvement in the shooting at the Crocus concert hall in Krasnogorsk near Moscow,’ said the country’s foreign ministry.
Macabre footage emerged of piles of bodies outside the concert venue. Hundreds of investigators and rescuers were still combing the smouldering scene early today.
One woman told how she feigned being shot – which saved her life. ‘They [the terrorists] were standing at the exit, we didn’t go there, but they saw us,’ she said.
‘One of them came running back and started shooting at us.
‘I fell on the floor, and pretended to die. A girl next to me was killed.
‘Then a fire started .
‘They [the terrorists] closed the door, but I guess they couldn’t lock it [so that people were trapped inside a burning building].
‘I lay under the door and breathed the air coming through there. After a while I crawled out. Three minutes, maybe four minutes, maybe.
‘I crawled out, looked around. Crawled to the exit and realised there was no one there, so I got outside.
A video grab show people evacuating the Crocus City Hall in the Russian capital
Concertgoers leave the building as armed terrorists open fire at the Crocus City Hall in Moscow
Scores of people hid behind seats in the hall or rushed towards entrances to the basement
INTERPOL made clear it stood ready to help identify and catch the killers.
Secretary general of Interpol Jürgen Stock said: ‘I strongly condemn the attack at the Crocus City Hall which was a terrible act against innocent civilians.
‘Our thoughts are with the victims, and their families and friends. INTERPOL is ready to provide support to the investigation by Russian authorities.’
Other reports said a white car was stopped by police shooting through its tyres some 235 miles from Moscow on the Kyiv highway.
One suspect was held and handcuffed – Mukhammadsoobir Faizov, aged 19, and is in hospital wounded. His left eye cannot close due to damage. He is currently in the hospital undergoing surgery.
Three ran into the woods, and one has since been detained.
The police and security services have not confirmed any details of detentions so far.
Influential Russian MP and journalist Alexander Khinshtein said: ‘The Renault in which the suspects were driving was discovered at night in the area of the village Khatsun, Bryansk region.
‘The car did not stop at the request of law enforcement officers and tried to escape.
‘During the pursuit, shots were fired and the car overturned.
‘One suspected terrorist was detained on the spot, the rest fled into the forest.
‘As a result of the search, a second suspect was found and detained at approximately 3:50 a.m.
‘The search for the others continues. All law enforcement agencies are involved in the operation.
‘A PM pistol, a magazine for an AKM assault rifle and passports of citizens of Tajikistan were found in the Renault car.’
One extraordinary account told of a man who overpowered a suspected terrorist in the hall, allowing several dozen concert-goers to escape.
Elena, 61, told how she eyed a gunman near the stage shooting people who ran in his direction. ‘A young man jumped on him,’ she said.
‘I didn’t see how he jumped, I just saw how he had already taken the machine gun away from him and beat him with the butt of it.’
With bodies lying nearby, she said: ‘He just gave us the opportunity to all go out through the stage, through the emergency exit we all ran out into the street.
‘He saved a lot of people. I don’t know if he was still alive…’
Yulia Khvatkova told in a harrowing account how she was wounded in the shooting as she and her boyfriend arrived late.
‘I was wounded in the shoulder, my boyfriend was hit in the arms and legs,’ she told ASTRA media.
‘A woman fell right next to me with a bullet through her temple.
‘A cheerful woman sold tickets at the entrance, and then we ran away, and she lay with these tickets with a bullet in her head.
‘I still have this picture before my eyes.
‘We ran over the corpses through the same doors, sirens were already heard, rapid response services and ambulances were driving.’
A view shows the Crocus City Hall concert venue following Friday’s deadly attack
Russian law enforcement officers walk at the site of a gun attack on the Crocus City Hall in Krasnogorsk, Moscow
Following Friday’s attack, tributes including flowers and a Teddy bear doll have been placed at a makeshift memorial in front of the Crocus City Hall in Krasnogorsk
A man places flowers at a makeshift memorial in front of the Crocus City Hall, a day after a gun attack in Krasnogorsk
A woman walks to lay flowers at the scene of the gun attack at the Crocus City Hall concert hall
A woman walks to lay flowers at the scene of the gun attack at the Crocus City Hall concert hall
Bodies of victims are loaded into vehicles at the Crocus City Hall on the western edge of Moscow, Russia
A view shows two Russian police officers stood in front of the Crocus City Hall concert venue following Friday’s deadly attack
Despite warnings of an attack on mass audience venues, she said: ‘The only thing that confused me was that there was no security, no reinforcement, no cordon at any entrance.
‘It seems like a mass event. But no one at all. Even at the metal detectors there were no guards.’
Footage showed how the attackers arrived at Crocus and passed a police patrol to enter the hall.
There were claims that the attackers had both Kalashnikov assault rifles, and flamethrowers.
But other accounts said they had cans with a flammable liquid inside which they poured first and then set on fire.
Vladimir Putin failed to speak to Russians about the massacre overnight, but his deputy premier Tatyana Golikova said he Putin ‘wished all those injured in the terrorist attack at Crocus a recovery and expressed gratitude to the doctors’.
Major events were being cancelled for the coming days, and Moscow’s Red Square was sealed off.
Versions varied as to who the perpetrators were.
The US had led Western warnings at the possibility of an ‘extremist’ attack on Moscow, but suggested that the danger period for this was two weeks ago.
US reports today suggest an ISIS offshoot was behind the attack, namely Wilayat Khorasan, which is based in Afghanistan.
But John Kirby, Strategic Communications Coordinator, White House National Security Council, said: ‘Right now we don’t know to what extent this warning [from the US Embassy in early March] and this attack are related.
‘But we had some concerns about the possibility of a terrorist attack in and around Moscow earlier this month.’
ISIS appeared to claim responsibility but there was uncertainty over whether this could be trusted.
There were reports today that the Moscow security services suspect the Russian Volunteer Corps [RDK], a far-right paramilitary unit of Russian citizens, based in Ukraine.
‘Just on the eve of the terrorist attack, FSB officers detained in Moscow a whole group of their supporters who were planning to go to fight in Ukraine, but in the meantime were committing minor sabotage in Russia,’ reported Kommersant citing security sources.
‘It was said that the terrorists were young people, Slavs, they were taller than average, up to 180 cm, and may have used false beards and moustaches.’
A huge column of smoke filling the air around the Crocus City Hall
Witnesses described scenes of panic and pandemonium as crowds heard sounds of shooting in the hall
Armed officers have been deployed to deal with the incident
Pictured: Men covering themselves with blankets as a Russian law enforcement officer stands guard near the burning concert hall
The RDK denied the possibility of participation in the terrorist attack.
Russian senator Andrey Klishas claimed the terrorist attack in Crocus was part of the war that Western intelligence services have been waging with Russia for many years.
‘Support for terrorists in the Caucasus in the 1990s, the coup in Ukraine in 2014, the breakdown of the Minsk agreements, the extermination of civilians in Novorossiya, Russophobia, support for neo-Nazism, Crocus. All these are stages of the same war with Russia and there is only one customer here.’
Ukrainian outlet Pravda Gerashchenko alleged that ‘Russian special services either knew or were themselves the organisers of the terrorist attack….
‘The topic of vote rigging in ‘elections’ was removed from the agenda.’
Ukrainian military intelligence blamed the operation on Russian secret services and said they were likely to use the consequences to increase support for the military conflict.
Russian oligarch Konstantin Malofeev called for a nuclear strike.
‘Let’s give the civilian population of Ukraine 48 hours to leave the cities and finally end this war with the victorious defeat of the enemy. Using all forces and means,’ he posted.
Russian businessman, Yevgeny Chichvarkin, said: ‘Putin has no money or ability to protect himself from these terrorists, nor from natural and man-made disasters, but he has the money to bomb a foreign country every damn day and maintain a 600,000-strong army there.
‘Putin has plenty of cops to beat up journalists, disperse demonstrations, destroy gay clubs, persecute dissidents, but there is none to directly work to protect the population.
‘As long as Putin is in power, blood will spill non-stop.
‘Every day, about 40 ambulances arrive for the morning ambulance train from the east of Ukraine and transport the wounded to hospitals.
‘The Russian authorities are arranging what you saw in Crocus every day. Every! Damn! Day! Think about it. Two years. Every day. Horror!’
The Tajikistan foreign ministry hit out at false reports over its citizens being involved.
This was ‘unverified and unreliable information on the perpetrators of the terrorist attack’.
Russian political scientist Sergei Karnaukhov alleged Ukrainian involvement.
‘Unfortunately, it is not yet possible to post insider information as the work is still in progress.
‘The terrorist evacuation group was Ukrainian – this is all I can say.’