Swift condemnation followed a suicide blast at Moscow’s main airport that killed at least 35 people on Monday, with Nato chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen offering Russia the Western alliance’s “solidarity”.
“We are in this fight together,” the defence organisation’s secretary general said in a statement, after the blast in the packed arrivals hall of Domodedovo international airport.
“This is why in the Nato-Russia Council we have to strengthen our cooperation in the fight against terrorism,” the Dane said, on the eve of high-level talks between Nato and Russian officials in Brussels.
A “shocked” Rasmussen underlined: “This is a common threat that we have to face united. Nato expresses its solidarity with the Russian people and government.”
European Parliament president Jerzy Buzek, a former Polish prime minister, added his “sympathy” for the people of Russia, who have “repeatedly suffered from similar inhumane acts in the recent past.”
US President Barack Obama condemned the attack as “outrageous”, which left 35 people dead and more than 100 wounded.
“I strongly condemn this outrageous” act, the US leader said, quoted by White House spokesperson Robert Gibbs.
Scenes of carnage
There were scenes of carnage at the airport in southern Moscow as corpses were stretchered out of the arrivals area after the blast, the latest deadly attack to hit the capital after the metro bombings in March.
Describing the attack as an act of terror, President Dmitry Medvedev chaired an emergency meeting of transport and security officials and ordered a special security regime across the country’s main airports and railway stations.
France and Germany both called the attack “barbaric”, while British Foreign Secretary William Hague said he was “deeply shocked and saddened”.
“The president of the republic assures the authorities of the Russian Federation of the entire solidarity of France in the face of this barbaric and cowardly terrorist act,” President Nicolas Sarkozy’s office said.
“I condemn this dreadful and bloody attack in the strongest possible terms. Nothing can justify this barbaric act,” German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said in a statement. “Our deepest sympathies go out to the friends and families of the victims.”
Bulgaria’s foreign ministry also said that “no cause exists that justifies the killing of innocent people”, as President Georgy Parvanov sent a letter of condolences to his Russian counterpart, Medvedev. — AFP