What are the Russian papers saying about the Moscow restaurant bombing?

Good morning from Moscow.It's Monday the 3rd of August.Now, today's papers are the first to come out since Saturday's bomb attack on an Italian restaurant in Moscow.A big news story, that.And yet, look through today's newspapers in Russia, and there's barely a mention of it.It's almost as if nothing had happened.

I did find one tiny paragraph about it in today's Niezawisome Gazeta, in a wider piece about Russia's war on Ukraine.And even here they got the date of the bomb blast wrong.On the 25th of July, it was actually the 1st of August, in the evening, on Kudrinskaya Square in Moscow, an act of terror was committed, in which 5 people were killed and more than 20 wounded.

According to one theory, the explosion could have been organised by the Ukrainian secret services to eliminate a high -ranking Russian military commander.And that's pretty much it.So why so little about this story?Well, keep in mind that today the Russian media environment is much more tightly controlled than in previous years.

And I wonder whether a decision was taken on high not to go big on a story which perhaps the Russian authorities think could create anxiety, alarm in society.In other words, a story of someone walking into a restaurant with a bomb.The bomb goes off, killing and injuring people.Plus, If that theory in Nezhevissima Gazeta today is correct, you also have the military element to this, which may be seen as another reason to avoid going into detail.

There's no doubt that the Russian newspapers, particularly the ultra -pro -Kremlin ones, prefer to run stories that make the Russian military look powerful and successful.Hence headlines like these today in the government paper Rassiska Gazeta, The Advance of Our Troops Cannot Be Stopped, and in Moskovsky Komsomolets, burning bridges, the Russian army continued to isolate Ukraine,from the outside world by striking the strategically important Zatoka bridge.The paper also repeats the message we've been hearing from Moscow for some time now, that the tide in the war has not turned in favour of Kiev.Where is the turning point if Ukraine has become totally defenceless against Russian missiles?that nearly every day take out enterprises of the military -industrial complex, logistics, and everything that is valuable for Ukraine's armed forces.

Now, you might say, OK, the restaurant bombing barely gets a mention.But other news, which is not good news for the Russian authorities, like, for example, the Ukrainian drone strikes on Wildberry's warehouses, that does get column space.

How come?For example, in today's Komsomolskaya Pravda, the paper quotes video comments by Wildberry's CEO Tatyana Kim, who says, among other things, that the aim of the attacks is to exert pressure, destabilize, and spark panic and shock among a large number of Russians.

What I would say is it would be hard for the authorities and the media here to ignore the Wildberries attacks, such as their scale and the effect on the population in Russia.But also, even this story is not dominating the papers.There's not a lot about it, but it is covered.One other thing that you see more and more in the Russian papers is the depiction of Russians who've left the country and who've been critical of the war, their depiction in a negative light.

On the front page of Komsomolskaya Pravda today, the paper asks, what is life like for Russian stars who fled abroad?The paper claims that showbiz stars who left Russia amid scandal after the start of the special military operation have lost their fans abroad and their earnings.Mind you, inside Russia as well.-Komsomolets points out, inflation is once again gathering pace.The paper talks about new risks linked to fuel, logistics, and the upcoming rise in communal tariffs.Which brings us onto the jokes section of Moskovsky -Komsomolets.

When I was young, I was poor.After years of hard, honest, painstaking labour, I am no longer young.