300 Muslims were detained at a prayer room in Russia following orders from President Vladimir Putin ordered police to make a concentrated effort to crackdown on the radical islamist groups in the country before the beginning of the Winter Olympics, according to reports.
300 Muslims, including 170 foreigners, were held at a Muslim prayer room in the capital, and police said Islamist literature had been confiscated, according to Radio Free Europe. Muslims have previously come under attack by Russian police forces, as they crackdown on Muslim places of worship, Reuters reported.
The "fight against corruption, crime and the insurgency has to be carried out harshly and consistently," Putin told a meeting of security force officers, according to the radio station.
According to the report, there are nearly 23 million Muslims living in the Russian Federation, mostly in the north of the Caucasus and southern republics of Chechnya, Ingushetia, and Dagestan. Russia has struggled with an insurgency stemming from two wars against separatists in Chechnya and North Ossetia.
