Two men involved in a high-profile hostage crisis in the southwestern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don last month were sent to pretrial detention for at least two months, the unified press service of the courts in the Rostov region said on July 11.
According to the press service, one of the men, Daniil Kamnev, who was wounded by special forces who stormed the detention center in Rostov-on-Don on June 16 and freed two guards taken hostage, confessed to being a member of the At-Takfir Wal-Hijra Islamic group, which is designated as a "terrorist" group and banned in Russia.
The press service said Kamnev also confessed to being involved in the preparation of a bombing in the city of Kislovodsk in 2021.
A second suspect, Malik Gandaloyev, confessed to being a member of the Islamic State group, which is also designated as a "terrorist" group and banned in Russia, and to making and possessing an explosive device, the press service said.
Kamnev and Gandaloyev were among six inmates who took two guards hostage in the detention center on June 16. All of the other hostage-takers were killed during the attempt to free the hostages.
The six were being held in the detention center on terrorism charges. Some of them were from Russia's mostly Muslim-populated North Caucasus regions of Ingushetia and Chechnya. They had been convicted of terrorism charges in December.
Islamic State has carried out several attacks in Russia in recent years, including most recently in late March, when gunmen opened fire on a crowd at a concert hall in an entertainment center near Moscow, killing 145 people.