Arrests after Dagestan bomb

Bomb aftermath: Flowers rest on a drum played during the Victory Day parade

MAKHACHKALA, Russia (CNN) -- Three people have been arrested after a bomb blast in Russia that killed 41 people attending a Victory Day parade marking the end of World War II.

Flags in the southern republic of Dagestan flew at half-mast and all TV entertainment programmes were cancelled on Friday as the regional council declared a national day of mourning

An explosive device hidden in bushes is believed to have been remotely detonated as a bus carrying servicemen -- mainly musicians -- went off along the route of the parade in the southern Russian republic of Dagestan on Thursday.

Federal Security Service chief Nikolai Patrushev said no one claimed responsibility for the blast, but suggested Islamic militants with ties to the strict Wahhabi branch of Islam were to blame

He added: "We have already determined the group of individuals that could have been involved in this.

"We know they have been involved in organising terrorist attacks in the past. They, of course, have connections first of all to Wahhabism."

He said three people were being interrogated and that an artist's impression of the suspect believed to have planted the mine had been compiled.

Patrushev said the suspects might have links to "illegal armed groups," the phrase Russian officials use to refer to rebel forces in neighbouring Chechnya.

Five people died in hospital overnight, a spokesman at the regional Interior Ministry was quoted by The Associated Press as saying, bringing the total dead to 41.

A further 130 marchers, who had been marking the Allied victory over Nazi Germany at the end of World War II, were injured.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has condemned the attack as an act of terrorism and promised swift action finding and bringing to trial the culprits.

Ria news agency quoted the president as saying: "Nobody doubts that this was a terrorist act. In the shortest possible time, we will find, convict and punish the criminals."

The bomb exploded as a military parade was passing through a square in the city of Makhachkala, on the Caspian Sea at about 10 a.m..

The victims included children, veterans and musicians who were marching down the street toward a cemetery to lay wreaths at the town's Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. (Full story)

Islamic militants have previously been blamed for a blast in a Kaspiisk apartment building housing Russian border guards killed 68 people.