St. Petersburg metro security officers might be accused of negligence due to terrorist attack

Policemen and security officers working in the St. Petersburg metro might be accused of negligence in connection with the April 3 terrorist attack, reported newspaper Kommersant on Wednesday.

According to Kommersant, the investigative team seeks, amongst other things, to determine how the terrorist managed to enter the metro with two homemade bombs without meeting any obstacles. Investigators have not ruled out that this could have been occurred due to the negligence of the metro security officers, who are tasked with monitoring the metal detectors installed at the entrances to the metro, and police.

Police officers and security personnel are required to assess passengers to determine who may pose a risk not only by relying on security technology, but also by looking at appearance, and to conduct preventive conversations with them and conduct screenings.

“A good metal detector could not fail to [go off if someone were to pass] carrying two fire extinguishers filled with small balls and explosives, and if [the devices] had been examined, even someone who is an expert would have discerned that they were actually bombs,” write Kommersant.

Deputies in the municipal legislature from the Yabloko and A Fair Russia political partis demanded that St. Petersburg governor Georgi Poltavchenko report on funds spent on security systems in the subway.

In particular, they ask for information on the effectiveness of metal detectors in which about 60 million rubles (today approximately $1,071,613) were invested in 2015, as well as to provide data on the number of terrorist acts prevented by this equipment. The deputies also asked the city mayor what security measures are expected to be introduced to local transport in light of the terrorist attack.

At about 3 o’clock in the afternoon on April 3, a terrorist attack occurred within the third card of a train passing from the Sennaya Ploshchad metro station to the Tekhnologichesky Institut metro station St. Petersburg. A homemade explosive device went off in the car. It turned out that this had been an attack carried out by a suicide bomber, who had, apparently, also left a bomb at the Ploshchad Vosstaniya station – a bomb that was later found and deactivated by operatives. The attack took the lives of 14 people and left more than 50 passengers injured.

According to Russia’s Investigative Committee, the bomb was planted by twenty-two-year-old Kyrgyz citizen Akbarjon Jalilov – a suicide bomber.

According to news agency Interfax, investigators are seeking to determine whether Jalilov had been recruited by radical Islamists during his trip to his homeland in early 2017. Investigative Committee head Aleksander Bastrykin also instructed that investigators look into possible links between Jalilov and the self-proclaimed Islamic State group.