Russia says detains suspect in Moscow bomb attacks

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's security service on Monday said it detained a suspect in a suicide bomb attack that killed at least 40 people on the Moscow metro in March and arrested six women preparing new attacks on central Russia.

Russia is struggling to contain an upsurge of attacks by rebels in the mainly Muslim provinces on its southern flank who in March took their war to the Russian heartland with suicide bombings in the Moscow metro, which injured at least 100.

The National Anti-terror Committee, part of the FSB security service, said in a statement that eight suspects were detained in a house in Makhachkala, capital of the mainly Muslim region of Dagestan.

"One of the detained men in March of this year delivered the suicide bombers who committed terrorist acts at the Lubyanka and Park Kultury metro stations" in Moscow, the statement said.

Authorities have said both women who blew themselves up in the Moscow attack were natives of Dagestan, which has eclipsed nearby Chechnya as a centre of rebel activity.

Four of the six detained women, who were aged between 15 and 29, were the widows of rebels killed by the authorities, the statement said.

"Officers seized the detained suspects "farewell" letters to their families, expressing their wish to end their life and advising their "sisters" to follow suit," it said.

A video played on state television showed two handguns, a silencer, a belt for explosives and three grenades. A young girl in a grey head scarf is shown describing how she was trained to use grenades.

Local leaders say a potent mix of clan feuds, poverty, Islamism and heavy-handed tactics by law enforcement agencies has driven youths into the hands of rebels who want to create a Sharia-based pan-Caucasus state.