A file photo for Russian Muslims supplicating to God

By Damir Ahmad, IOL Correspondent

MOSCOW, September 18 (IslamOnline.net) – Muslims in Russia have become under increasingly racist and violent attacks in the wake of the Beslan school hostage-taking tragedy, Muslim officials in Moscow said Saturday, September 18.

The abuses take different forms from raping and body assaults to attacks on mosques and other Islamic places in the country, the officials, who requested anonymity, told IslamOnline.net.

On September 16, a Muslim woman was found in a remote area in the eastern city of Asbest raped and tortured to death, Russia ’s NTV network reported according to the Russian police.

The 45-year-old mother of three was hit on the head by an iron device by unknown attackers, who wrote "Death to terrorists" on the back of her naked body.

The Islamic Administration in Asbest condemned the attack, calling for arresting the perpetrators of such a heinous crime.  

Attacks on Mosques

In similar attacks against Muslims and Islamic places in the country, six Russian young men attacked on September 15 a mosque in the city of Noyaborsk in northern Russia .

The mob stained the walls of the mosque with racist remarks and smashed its windows, an official at the Russian Mufti Council told IOL.

The six attackers were arrested by mosque workers and handed to the Russian police, the official added.

Unknown people have also accosted and battered a mosque imam in the city of   Sterlitamak in Bashkiria Republic . The imam is now in a critical condition due to severe head injuries.

Add to that, local authorities in the city of Nalchik , in Kabardino Balkaria Republic , had recently closed down six mosques in the area for claims they spread out extremist ideas among residents of the area.

Up to 40,000 Russian Muslims took to the streets to protest at the hostage-taking school tragedy in the southern city of Beslan.

More than 322 people, including 155 children, were killed and at least 700 others were injured in Beslan when the Russian special forces stormed a school in northern Ossetia to release 1000 children and parents taken hostage by militants in northern Ossetia .

The attack was reportedly claimed by Chechen fighter Shamil Basayev though veteran leader Aslan Maskhdov had condemned the attack and vigorously distanced himself from it.

Russia has a Muslim population of 20 million people concentrated in north of the Caucasus and in the central parts of the country.