The Russian intelligence services discovered a bomb-making factory when they raided a secret mosque in the city of Samara. The explosives they found in the building were so unstable that they had to be detonated on the spot, leaving the mosque a little worse for the wear and tear.

Many thanks to D@rLin|{ for the translation, and to Vlad Tepes for subtitling this report from Russian television:

Transcript:

00:00 The bomb, found today in an illegal prayer house in Samara, was destroyed in place.

00:04 It was too dangerous to move 2 kilograms of TNT.

00:09 For the raid’s duration the state route M-5 was closed.

00:12 A Salafist group that used this villa on the outskirts of Samara was detained early in the morning.

00:17 More than 50 cell members were arrested. One of them is known to the FSB for uploading forbidden ISIS videos;

00:22 the other one had an arsenal of weapons and ammunition.

00:27 With us Stas Natanson, welcome!

00:30 Are there any recruiters amongst the detained? According to special services, at least two of them are.

00:37 It was an ordinary two-story brick house in Samara’s suburbs, but it served

00:44 as a hiding place for a big terrorist group.

00:48 Not just extremist books were there — also several kilos of homemade explosives.

00:54 The bomb squad decided not to risk the premature explosion of an amateur bomb,

01:00 and detonated it inside the house.

01:11 The explosion’s aftermath makes it clear

01:14 how potentially destructive the terror attack planned by this group could be.

01:17 More than 50 people were arrested, two of them having been wanted by the FSB for a long time.

01:23 During the preventive operation at the Salafist cell hideout in Samara, its members were detained.

01:36 Some of them known to be members of terrorist organizations.

01:43 This cell was a home to Ruslan Kanteev and others, who are currently in Syria,

01:51 fighting for illegal militant groups.

01:59 It is still under investigation whether all those arrested are terrorists.

02:04 It could be that many of those visiting the illegal mosque,

02:08 didn’t know that they are being recruited.

02:11 This is the case with two medical students from Kabardino-Balkaria.

02:15 At first they were invited to come to illegal prayer houses and then offered to go to fight in Syria.

02:22 “As you get to Istanbul, go to such and such — gave us contacts”

02:31 A similar prayer house was discovered a year ago at the Volgograd State Medical Academy.

02:42 Recruitment there was a smoothly-running process, divided into three stages.

02:46 First, an informer found single men and passed them on to a motivator.

02:51 The motivator’s job was to brainwash the victims and only then did a recruiter step in.

02:56 Alexey Grishnin — President of “Religion and Society” analytical center. The motivator

02:59 would say that tomorrow or the day after a great guru is coming,

03:02 he will explain everything, he is very famous in Islamic circles, very prodigious scholar,

03:09 and this scholar wants to meet you, because you are an exceptionally bright young man.

03:18 This guru is in fact an agent recruiter, who gives the offer and shows how to move to the Middle East,

03:28 and how to join a militant group

03:33 The closed prayer house in the Medical Academy was, of course, not the only one in this area.

03:40 Just a few weeks ago, during a raid in Volgograd region, another terror cell was arrested

03:46 in another ordinary house. They had weapons and explosives.

03:56 Chemicals found in their possession indicated that they were in process of making a bomb.

04:00 How many such cells exist in ordinary private houses across the country, nobody can say.