A disinformation campaign has been launched by the Kremlin alleging that Friday’s terrorist attack in Moscow was caused by MI6.
The network of automated "bot" social media accounts has been sharing links to fake websites.
The Insider reports that these websites were deliberately designed to look like well-known news outlets, that blame MI6 and other Western intelligence agencies for the massacre that left 167 people dead.
Facebook parent company Meta Platform reports the spam attack was carried out by the Russian IT companies National Technologies and Social Design Agency.
Over a hundred people were killed inside the Crocus City Hall in Moscow
Reuters
These two companies have fallen under EU sanctions and have been linked to the Kremlin. Isis has claimed responsibility for the terrorist attack, a claim that has been backed up by US intelligence.
Putin has acknowledged was carried out by Islamic militants, but suggested it was also to the benefit of Ukraine and that Kyiv may have played a role.
The Russian President said: "We know that the crime was carried out by the hand of radical Islamists with an ideology that the Muslim world has fought for centuries...the question that arises is who benefits from this?...This atrocity may be just a link in a whole series of attempts by those who have been at war with our country since 2014 by the hands of the neo-Nazi Kyiv regime."
"We know by whose hand the crime against Russia and its people was committed. But what is of interest to us is who ordered it."
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Putin lights a candle in memory of those killed in the terrorist attack in Moscow
Reuters
Ukraine has denied any role in Friday's shooting and President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has accused Putin of seeking to divert blame.
Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron told reporters earlier today: "The information available to us ... as well as to our main partners, indicates indeed that it was an entity of the Islamic State that instigated this attack. This group also tried to commit several actions on our own soil."
Putin said 11 people had been detained, including the four suspected gunmen, who he said had made their way to the Bryansk region, about 340 km southwest of Moscow, to try to slip into Ukraine.
Unverified videos of their interrogations circulated on social media. One was shown having part of his ear cut off and stuffed into his mouth.
The false information sites claimed MI6 was behind the attacks
Getty/PA
One man, Dalerdzhon Mirzoyev, leaned against a glass cage as the terrorism charge was read out. Saidakrami Rachabalizoda, his ear in bandages, remained sitting.
Muhammadsobir Fayzov appeared in hospital clothes in a wheelchair, his face covered in cuts.
Shamsiddin Fariduni stood, his face bruised.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov declined to answer a journalist's question about whether they had been tortured.
