Russia says ISIL behind deadly Moscow concert hall attack

MOSCOW

Russia on Friday said for the first time that the ISIL coordinated the March concert hall attack in Moscow, the country's deadliest terror attack in two decades.

"In the course of the investigation... it has been established that the preparations, the financing, the attack and the retreat of the terrorists were coordinated via the internet by members of ISIL,"  Alexander Bortnikov, the head of FSB, was quoted as saying by the RIA Novosti news agency.

ISIL has claimed responsibility on multiple occasions for the March 22 attack which killed over 140 people, but Moscow has repeatedly tried to link Ukraine and the West to the attack.

Bortnikov did not discard the Ukrainian angle in his statements on Friday, saying that "upon completing the attack, the terrorists received clear instructions to move toward the Ukrainian border, where from the other side a 'window' had been prepared for them", he said.

Ukraine has repeatedly denied involvement.

Gunmen in camouflage stormed the Crocus City Hall venue on the outskirts of Moscow before setting the building on fire.

More than a dozen suspects have been arrested including the four assailants, who are all from the Central Asian nation of Tajikistan, an impoverished former Soviet republic on Afghanistan's northern border.

The United States has said it had publicly and privately warned Russia in early March that extremists were planning an attack on a concert hall in Moscow.

Unnamed U.S. intelligence officials told American media outlets after the massacre that they had told Moscow it was the Crocus City Hall specifically that ISIL was planning to attack.

Russia dismissed those warnings. Just three days before the attack, President Vladimir Putin accused Washington of "blackmail" and trying to "intimidate" Russians.