MOSCOW: Russia’s security service yesterday said it had uncovered an alleged bomb-making laboratory in Moscow as officers detained four suspected Islamic State group members plotting “terror attacks” on public transport. The FSB said those held included citizens of Russia and ex-Soviet Central Asia who were “preparing terror attacks with the use of homemade explosives on Moscow’s transport infrastructure.” “As a result of searches at the detainees’ places of residence a laboratory for making explosives was discovered and a ready-made explosive device,” the agency said in a statement.

The alleged terror cell was directed by IS leadership in Syria and the suspects planned to flee there after the planned attacks to fight for the extremist group, it added. The detentions are the latest in a broad security sweep as Russia remains on heightened alert after a suicide attack on the Saint Petersburg metro that killed 15 people in April. —AFP