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| Suicide bomber Naida Asiyalova's passport |
VOLGOGRAD, Russia (AP) — Russian security forces hunted on Tuesday for the husband of a bomber who blew herself up on a bus in southern Russia, killing six people and wounding more than 30. They also raised the possibility that Moscow, not Volgograd, was the bomber's original target.
Adding to the mystery surrounding Monday's explosion, Russian state television released pictures of the attacker's passport that looked different, even though they carried the same number.
Investigators say 30-year-old Naida Asiyalova, a native of the volatile province of Dagestan in Russia's North Caucasus region, was married to an ethnic Russian man who had joined Islamic militants. They say her husband, Dmitry Sokolov, has become a top rebel expert in explosives and could have been involved in equipping his wife for the suicide mission.
Sokolov has been on the run since he left his home in a Moscow suburb in the summer of 2012, according to the investigators.
The bombing in the southern Volgograd region was the first attack against a civilian target outside the volatile North Caucasus region in years, raising fears of a new wave of terror just three-and-half months before the start of the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi. [...]
The bomb was rigged with shrapnel, which caused severe injuries and left many of the wounded in grave condition. Most of the passengers were students coming home after lessons.
Dmitry Yudin, a student who suffered a concussion and arm wound, said he had noticed Asiyalova when she boarded the bus because she wore a dark Islamic headscarf. He told The Associated Press the suspected attacker looked "calm and collected" and kept a low profile.
Rasul Temirbekov, a spokesman for the Investigative Committee's regional branch in Dagestan, said Asiyalova met Sokolov, a university student, in Moscow and recruited him to join the rebels in Dagestan. He studied Islam and the Arabic, took the nom de guerre of Abdul Jabbar and quickly gained a reputation with the militants.
Investigators believe Sokolov had prepared explosives for a suicide bomber who blew herself up outside the regional branch of Russia's Interior Ministry in Dagestan in May, killing 12 people.
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