Two female suicide bombers with hexagon bombs strapped to their chests blew themselves up on the subway in central Moscow during rush hour this morning, killing at least 35 people and injuring another 100. Although no group has yet to claim responsibility, Officials from the Federal Security Service, successor to the Soviet-era KGB, suspect Islamic militants from the volatile Northern Caucasus are to blame. Fighting between Russia and the Islamic separatists demanding independence for their native Chechnya has raged sporadically for about fifteen years. Last month, at least 20 Chechen rebels were killed by Russian forces in the neighboring region of Ingushetia. This action prompted Doku Umarov, the Chechen insurgent leader, to vow that "the zone of military operations will be extended to the territory of Russia…the war is coming to their cities," according to a Feb. 14 interview posted on the website kavkazcenter.com. Umarov’s declaration of "holy war" also came amid recent reports from Amnesty International that Russia has committed human rights violations, including kidnapping and torture, against Chechen citizens. The Chechen separatists have taken responsibility or been blamed for past subway explosions in Moscow. In February 2004, a suicide bomber detonated a device on the Zamoskvoretskaya line killing 40 people. This time, Vladimir Putin, who returned from his trip in Siberia to supervise emergency response efforts, pledged angrily on Russian television that “law-enforcement agencies will do everything to find the criminals and bring them to justice. The terrorists will be destroyed." The BBC reported that President Dmitry Medvedev told senior officials in an emergency meeting that he will uphold the "policy of suppressing terror and the fight against terrorism."
The Burmese opposition party, National League for Democracy (NLD), led by Aung San Suu Kyi, will boycott Myanmar’s first election in 20 years on the grounds of undemocratic conditions under the nation’s military rule. “After a vote of the committee members, the NLD party has decided not to register as a political party because the election laws are unjust,” said Nyan Win, a spokesman for the NLD. Mynmar’s election legislation nullified the result of the last poll held in 1990 that were won by the NLD by a landslide before but quickly suppressed by the junta. The law also requires expulsion of party members convicted of crimes. Suu Kyi was convicted last year of allowing an unregistered visitor to stay at her home and has been under house arrest since. According to current election laws, Suu Kyi would be unable to retain membership in the NLD, a party that she helped found. The NLD now faces dissolution for failing to register, though Suu Kyi observed, "If the NLD is dissolved, one cannot assume the NLD will deteriorate, the NLD is not my own thing, nor anyone’s possession." The election laws are part of the government’s controversial seven-step “Roadmap to Democracy,” which has been called a “mockery of democracy” by the United States.
Somali protestors took to the streets of Mogadishu in a rare demonstration against the militant extremist group al-Shabab, which controls large stretches of the country. "We have been forced out of our houses because of the violence instigated by al-Shabab. We are here to support the government and make our voices against them heard," said one of the marchers, Hawo Abdulle Aden. Unprecedented protests were sparked when members of al-Shabab began attacking tombs of venerated Sufi clerics with hoes and pickaxes. In response to why the revered tombs were being destroyed, the head of al-Shabab in Mogadishu, Ali Mohamed Husein, said that “citizens have been worshipping the remains of the dead bodies in tombs and that is why we want to eradicate them, because there is nothing to worship or to ask help from but Allah.” Demonstrators are also speaking out against the influx of foreign jihadists who have come to the country to join al-Shabab in its activities. The extremist group controls much of central and southern Somalia, following a strict and often brutal strict Wahhabi interpretation of Islam, clashing with the more moderate Sufi Islam of many Somalis. Somalia has been mired in conflict since 1991 when warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre, then turned against each other, plunging the country into two decades of chaos.