June 25 () –
The High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Policy of the European Union, Josep Borrell, has condemned this Monday the terrorist attacks perpetrated against a church and a synagogue in the Russian republic of Dagestan, in the Caucasus, which left fifteen police officers and four civilians dead, one of them an Orthodox priest.
“I strongly condemn the terrorist attacks perpetrated on Sunday against Jewish and Christian religious sites, and against security forces in the republic of Dagestan (Russia). My deepest condolences to the families of the victims. I wholeheartedly wish a speedy recovery to the injured,” he expressed on his social network account X.
The assailants, of whom five have been neutralized, had launched an attack against a church and a synagogue in Derbent, a city near the border with Azerbaijan. There they have murdered the priest, identified as Father Nikolai Kotelnikov, whose throat has been beheaded. Later, they attacked a traffic police post in Makhachkala (the capital of Dagestan), an attack that was preceded by a shootout in the town of Sergokala.
The synagogue has been practically destroyed, according to local media, while the Christian temple has also suffered a smaller fire. The authorities have reported the arrest of the mayor of the Sergokalinski district, Magomed Omarov, for the involvement of two of his sons and one of his nephews, who have died in the shootout with security forces in Makhachkala.
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