Home-made bomb explodes in Russian supermarket, injures 10

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Policemen are seen outside a St Petersburg supermarket after an explosion there injured 10 people on Wednesday. Authorities have declined to refer to the act as terrorism, instead classifying it as “attempted murder of two or more people”. Photo: Reuters

Published: 5:24am, 28 Dec 2017Updated: 5:24am, 28 Dec 2017

At least 10 people were injured, one critically, when a home-made explosive device detonated in a supermarket in St Petersburg, authorities have confirmed.

The Investigative Committee, the nation’s top investigative agency, said a device containing shrapnel - identified in local news reports as ball bearings - and 200 grammes (7 ounces) of explosives went off at a storage area for customers’ bags.

Nine people were admitted to hospital after the attack, with one having suffered critical shrapnel wounds to their stomach, according to The Washington Post. As of Wednesday afternoon, no one had died.

No one has claimed responsibility for the explosion, which occurred at a branch of the Perekrestok supermarket chain in the city’s northwest Kalininsky district.

This is the second explosion to occur in Russia’s second-largest city this year after a deadly subway bombing in there in April. But police have declined to call the attack ‘terrorism’, instead classifying it as the attempted murder of two or more people.

An investigator speaks on the phone inside the St Petersburg supermarket. The device, which was rigged with shrapnel, was left in a luggage storage area. St Peterburg suffered a subway bombing earlier in the year. Photo: AP

Alexander Klaus, the chief of the local branch of the Investigative Committee, said 10 people were admitted to hospital with injuries. A criminal investigation has been launched.