Islamic terrorist plot to attack 2014 Winter Olympics foiled by Russia

Russia has uncovered an alleged plot by Islamic militants to attack the 2014 Winter Olympics in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, security sources in Moscow claimed yesterday.

Russia’s National Anti-Terrorism Committee (NAC) said the special services had confiscated arms, ammunition and explosives – including surface-to-air missiles and a flamethrower – in the breakaway Abkhazia region of Georgia, the South Caucasus country with which Russia went to war in 2008.

Any security breach around the games could be embarrassing for president Vladimir Putin, who hopes it can be used to boost Russia’s image.

Abkhazia, which Russia recognised as an independent nation after the war, is adjacent to Sochi on the Black Sea coast. The alleged attackers had also planned attacks in the run-up to the games in February 2014, the NAC said.

“Russia’s FSB [security service] was able to establish the fighters planned to move the weapons to Sochi from 2012 to 2014 and use them to carry out terrorist acts before and during the Olympic Games,” NAC said in a statement.

The NAC blamed the plot on the Caucasus Emirate, a lead group in an insurgency against Russian rule in the North Caucasus, where Russian troops have fought two wars in Chechnya since the 1991 Soviet collapse.

It suggested the group’s leader, Doku Umarov, had been co-operating with Georgian special services but did not give any details to support this allegation and the NAC report could not be independently verified.