MOSCOW: Russian investigators said Friday that a New Year’s Eve blast that killed 39 people was likely the result of a gas explosion, dismissing reports that the Daesh group was behind it.
The Investigate Committee said it was still investigating the explosion that ripped through an apartment block in the Urals city of Magnitogorsk, killing 39 people.
On New Year’s Day, three more people died when a minibus exploded not far from the affected building in the city.
On Thursday, an article in Deash’s weekly Arabic-language newspaper Al-Naba said the group was behind the blasts.
It said the Daesh group did not claim responsibility earlier for “security reasons.”
Daesh claimed the operation was carried out by members of its Caucasus branch, the media outlet said.
The Investigative Committee said it was too early to draw any conclusions as a probe was still under way.
“Conclusions about the circumstances of the tragedy in Magnitogorsk will be made following a set of investigative measures,” spokeswoman Svetlana Petrenko said in a statement.
She said a gas explosion was still the investigators’ main line of inquiry, even though they were considering all possibilities.
She said media should not trust “reports of terrorist organizations which — as we know — take credit for all high-profile accidents in various countries.”
A spokesman for the FSB said the security service would not comment. “All information will be published shortly,” he told AFP.
Immediately after the apartment blast, President Vladimir Putin and top ministers rushed to the scene of the tragedy, while the FSB quickly ruled out foul play.
Shortly after the explosions two local media outlets, citing law enforcement sources, said the apartment block blast was likely the result of a terror attack.
Russia rejects reports Daesh behind New Year’s Eve blast
Russia rejects reports Daesh behind New Year’s Eve blast
- Investigation on the explosion that ripped through an apartment block in the Urals city of Magnitogorsk, killing 39 people
- Daesh claimed the operation was carried out by members of its Caucasus branch
Rubio says new governance bodies for Gaza will be in place soon
- Rubio said progress had been made recently in identifying Palestinians to join the technocratic group and that Washington aimed to get the governance bodies in place “very soon,” without offering a specific timeline.
WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that a new governance structure for Gaza — made up of an international board and a group of Palestinian technocrats — would be in place soon, followed by the deployment of foreign troops, as the US hopes to cement a fragile ceasefire in Israel’s war in the Palestinian enclave.
Rubio, speaking at a year-end news conference, said the status quo was not sustainable in Gaza, where Israel has continued to strike Hamas targets while the group has reasserted its control since the October peace agreement brokered by the US.
“That’s why we have a sense of urgency about bringing phase one to its full completion, which is the establishment of the Board of Peace, and the establishment of the Palestinian technocratic authority or organization that’s going to be on the ground, and then the stabilization force comes closely thereafter,” Rubio said.
Rubio said progress had been made recently in identifying Palestinians to join the technocratic group and that Washington aimed to get the governance bodies in place “very soon,” without offering a specific timeline. Rubio was speaking after the US Central Command hosted a conference in Doha this week with partner nations to plan the International Stabilization Force for Gaza.
Two US officials said last week that international troops could be deployed in the strip as early as next month, following the UN Security Council’s November vote to authorize the force.
It remains unclear how Hamas will be disarmed, and countries considering contributing troops to the ISF are wary that Hamas will engage their soldiers in combat.
Rubio did not specify who would be responsible for disarming Hamas and conceded that countries contributing troops want to know the ISF’s specific mandate and how it will be funded.
“I think we owe them a few more answers before we can ask anybody to commit firmly, but I feel very confident that we have a number of nation states acceptable to all sides in this who are willing to step forward and be a part of that stabilization force,” Rubio said, noting that Pakistan was among the countries that had expressed interest.
Establishing security and governance was key to securing donor funding for reconstruction in Gaza, Rubio added.
“Who’s going to pledge billions of dollars to build things that are going to get blown up again because a war starts?” Rubio said, discussing the possibility of a donor conference to raise reconstruction funds.
“They want to know who’s in charge, and they want to know that there’s security so and that there’ll be long term stability.”
