Russian commandos quashed a mutiny at a southern Russian prison on Friday, killing the attackers and freeing their hostages, according to the local governor.
Inmates claiming to be motivated by radical Islam and armed with makeshift knives and an explosive vest briefly took control of Penal Colony No. 19 in the southern Volgograd region, according to videos posted on social media and verified by The New York Times. The Russian prison service said four guards had been killed and three injured in the attack.
Four of the attackers were killed by snipers as the Russian commandos stormed the prison late Friday afternoon, ending the mutiny. It was unclear how many inmates had joined the revolt.
“Criminals were liquidated during a special operation to free hostages in IK-19,” Volgograd’s governor, Andrei Bocharov, said in a Telegram post, referring to the facility by its Russian initials.
The mutiny is the latest attack attributed to Islamist militants in Russia, underlining the Kremlin’s difficulties in stemming domestic terrorism amid a prolonged war in Ukraine, which has recently spilled into Russian territory.
The state news agency TASS reported that at least some the attackers were natives of Central Asia, a predominantly Muslim region that has long been the main source of labor migrants in Russia. Two attackers came from Uzbekistan and another two from Tajikistan. Three of those men were serving time on drug charges and another for manslaughter, TASS reported.
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