Russian police arrest suspect in St. Petersburg blast case

Russian authorities have arrested a suspect in the killing of war blogger Vladlen Tatarsky at a cafe in St. Petersburg on Sunday, Russia's Investigative Committee said on Monday.

Tatarsky, whose real name is Maxim Fomin, had 560,000 followers on the messaging app Telegram and was one of the most prominent of Russia's war bloggers.

What Russia is saying about the attack

The suspect, Darya T., "has been detained on suspicion of involvement in the explosion in a cafe in St Petersburg," the committee said.

The interior ministry had placed T. on its wanted list ahead of detaining her. Her connection with the blast that killed Tatarsky was originally made by Russian media.

T. is a 26-year-old resident of St. Petersburg who had previously been arrested for her involvement in anti-war protests.

Witnesses said that the suspect had been at the talk being held by Tatarsky where she had asked him questions and engaged him in conversation before handing him a bust of himself as a gift.

Russian news reported that the blogger was killed when a bomb that had been hidden inside a statue exploded.

Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attack, but other Russian war bloggers have pointed the finger at Ukraine. They compared the killing of Tatarsky with that of Darya Dugina last year.

Dugina was killed when an explosive device planted on her car exploded. Her father, Alexander Dugin, is a far-right philosopher and close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, as well as a fervent supporter of the invasion of Ukraine.

Putin posthumously awarded the Order of Courage to Tatarsky "for courage and bravery shown during professional duty."

Who is being blamed?

Russian authorities blamed Ukraine for Dugina's death, a claim rejected by Kyiv. 

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the assassination of Tatarsky in St Petersburg was a "terrorist act" and cited Russia's Anti-Terrorism Committee in saying that there was evidence linking Ukraine to the bombing.

Russia's National Anti-terrorism Committee also said that Ukrainian intelligence had been aided in the killing of war blogger Vladlen Tatarsky by "agents" from the Anti-Corruption Fund, a banned campaign group set up by jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny.

Meanwhile, Dugin called Tatarsky "immortal" after his death, saying he died to save the Russian people.

Another top Russian pro-war figure, Yevgeny Prigozhin — the millionaire owner of the mercenary Wagner Group which has been involved in much of the recent fighting in Ukraine — said he owned the cafe where Tatarsky was killed.

Prigozhin also diverged from others, saying that the culprits for the attack were likely a "group of radicals" not connected to Kyiv.

Mykhailo Podolyak, an advisor to the Ukrainian president, said that Tatarsky's killing was indicative of domestic turmoil in Russia.

"Question of when domestic terrorism would become an instrument of internal political fight was a matter of time," he wrote on Twitter.

ab/rc (Reuters, AFP, AP)