MOSCOW, May 22 (RAPSI) - Dozens of Russians have been trained as terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan alongside the militants recently killed in the Moscow Region, the Federal Security Service (FSB) announced this Wednesday.

As reported earlier, two militants were killed in the Moscow Region during a special operation. The FSB revealed that the militants, residents of a near-Urals Russian region of Bashkortostan who trained in Afghanistan and Pakistan, were plotting a terrorist attack in Moscow.

According to the FSB, there are currently "around 50 residents of Bashkortostan undergoing training at Middle Eastern camps of international terrorist organizations."

The Islamic Party of Turkestan, a largely Uzbek movement, which the militants are thought to have belonged to is an Islamist group on the list of terrorist organizations determined by the Russian Supreme Court. The group is banned in many European countries, Central Asia and the United States. FSB chief Alexander Bortnikov believes the group poses a series threat to the world and is comparable to Al-Qaeda.

Last March, the Russian Interior Ministry reported that the leader of the group's Moscow cell was detained and was likely to be deported to Uzbekistan.

Russia’s Islamist insurgency, once confined largely to the republic of Chechnya, has spread across the North Caucasus and bordering regions in recent years. Over a decade after the war against Islamist separatists in Chechnya ended, Russian security forces continue to fight militants across the Russian Federation.