Clarification re Moscow Metro Bombings

As I wrote yesterday’s piece on the bombings on the Moscow Metro I drew upon a range of sources including the Russian-language versions of Izvestiia, Novaia gazeta and the English-language version of Pravda. The Novaia gazeta article stated the following:

“The explosion at Lubyanka happened as the doors closed on the second carriage; at Park Kultury it happened as the doors opened 5 carriages from the end.”

For those of you who read Russian, here is the original text:

Взрыв на Лубянке произошел при закрывании дверей во втором вагоне, на «Парке Культуры» произошел при открывании дверей, 5 вагон с конца.

As there was no mention of suicide bombers in this report at the time, I speculated upon the possibility that the explosions could have in some way been triggered by the door mechanisms of the respective carriages. Subsequent reporting indicates that this terrorist act was indeed perpetrated by two female suicide bombers, so I assume that this is based upon rather sounder evidence than my speculative inference vis-à-vis a potential trigger mechanism. Given that someone has left a comment at Sottnet linking to my article inferring that there has been some sort of deliberate effort to cover up the ‘fact’ that suicide bombers were not involved, I would like to state quite categorically that evidence strongly attests to the fact that this was an act conducted by two women.

Suicide bombing is an Islamist tactic of choice, and that is what we sadly witnessed in Moscow yesterday.