300 detained at Moscow Muslim prayer room following Putin crackdown

Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, shakes hands at the presentation ceremony of the top military brass in the Kremlin in Moscow, Friday, June 7, 2013. (AP Photo/RIA-Novosti, Alexei Nikolsky, Presidential Press Service)

Moscow police detained 300 Muslims after President Vladimir Putin ordered a crackdown on radical Islamists ahead of next year’s Winter Olympics in Sochi.

The 300 people, including 170 foreigners, were held at a Muslim prayer room in the capital, and police said Islamist literature had been confiscated, according to Radio Free Europe.

It is the third such raid targeting Muslim places of worship in Moscow or St. Petersburg this year, Reuters reported.

The “fight against corruption, crime and the insurgency has to be carried out harshly and consistently,” Putin told a meeting of security force officers, according to the radio station.