Three-day mourning declared in St. Petersburg after metro blast

The administration of St. Petersburg has declared three days of mourning starting from Tuesday after a metro blast on Monday.

"Three-day mourning is declared in the city from tomorrow on orders of St. Petersburg Governor Georgy Poltavchenko," TASS cited the administration's statement as saying.

The St. Petersburg governor said the city authorities will render all necessary assistance to the families of the dead and injured in the metro blast.

A bomb went off at about 14:40 Moscow time on Monday in a metro train car when the train was moving from Tekhnologichesky Institut Station to Sennaya Ploshchad Station in St. Petersburg. Investigators have qualified the explosion as a terrorist attack, but other possible versions are being looked into. According to latest data, 11 people were killed and 45 hospitalized following the St. Petersburg metro blast, the Information Center of the National Anti-Terrorist Committee (NAK) said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin late on Monday laid flowers at St. Petersburg’s Tekhnologichesky Institut metro station.

Three-day mourning declared was also declared in Simferopol. All entertainment events have been cancelled.

The events in St. Petersburg caused a wide resonance in the country and the whole world. People express sympathy for the citizens of St. Petersburg in social networks, check whether their friends in St. Petersburg are ok. Foreign users of social networks use a hashtag #JeSuisRussie and write words of support to the Russians.

World leaders, politicians and representatives of international organizations express their solidarity with the people of Russia and offer condolences to the families of those killed in the blast. The words of support were voiced in NATO, the OSCE and the Council of Europe. High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Federica Mogherini, assured solidarity with Russians on behalf of all 28 EU countries, the German government's official representative Steffen Siebert as well as the British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson expressed their condolences to the families of the victims on their Twitter pages. The statements about the events in St. Petersburg were made by the head of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker and the chairman of the European Council Donald Tusk.

US President Donald Trump called Monday's subway bombing in St. Petersburg a “terrible thing. German Chancellor Angela Merkel sent a telegram of condolences to the Russian President Vladimir Putin. President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko expressed his words of support to the Russians during a meeting with the Russian president in St. Petersburg. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev expressed his condolences to Vladimir Putin in connection with the terrorist attack. Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan sent a telegram of condolences to his Russian counterpart. Georgian President Georgi Margvelashvili also expressed condolences to the families and relatives of the victims on behalf of the Georgian people.