MOSCOW, September 30 (IslamOnline.net) - Most Russian Muslims have prevented their women from leaving alone due to escalation of racial assaults in the wake of the Beslan crisis, a leading Russian newspaper has reported.

Izvestia said in a report, published Wednesday, September 29, the 20 million Muslim community living in different towns fear female members could be soft targets in ugly incidents of hostility sparked after the seizure and hostage taking in Beslan, blamed on Chechen fighters.

Russia’s Council of Muftis, however, declined to set a number of racial incidents against Muslims since the deadly attacks in Beslan.

“Most Muslims fear reporting attacks carried out against them for fear of reprisal from extremist Russian groups,” a source in the council told IslamOnline.net Wednesday.

Several dozen skinheads rampaged through a metro carriage, stabbing passengers they believed were Muslims from southern regions and shouting “This one is for the terrorist act!”.

Three people from ex-Soviet Tajikistan and Azerbaijan were hurt in the incident.

Tens of Russians have, during the current month, attacked several Muslim young women in public places, underground stations and public squares, taking off their veils and pouring them with insults, the Russian newspaper reported.

The paper cited other examples of the cases, including an attempt by a number of Russian nationalists to attack a Muslim mother of six children in eastern Moscow; yet, policemen managed to save her life.

The newspaper disclosed another incident, that had never been published before, where unknown people hung posters on the walls of a mosque in western Moscow reading: “Islam Is a Religion for Non-Humans”.

Further, the paper said, Russian federal police have received instructions from the Interior Ministry to stop any hijab-clad woman to check her identity on claims of being a suspected “terrorist”.

Russians objecting to the presence of fellow passengers in Muslim dress have delayed four flights in the past month, with airport officials conducting additional checks on “suspect” passengers or moving them to other flights.

On September 16, a Muslim woman was found in a remote area in the eastern city of Asbest raped and tortured to death, Russia ’s NTV network reported citing Russian police sources.

The 45-year-old mother of three was hit on the head by an iron device by unknown attackers, who wrote "Death to terrorists" on the back of her naked body.

Unknown people have also accosted and battered a mosque imam in the city of Sterlitamak in Bashkiria Republic. The imam is now in a critical condition due to severe head injuries.

This came as President Vladimir Putin made an appeal for Russians not to give in to hatred of ethnic and religious minorities that he said extremists were trying to foment.

Addressing religious leaders Wednesday, Putin said Russians had to ensure that the battle to crush extremism bred no hatred in a country with more than 100 ethnic groups.

Putin's appeal for tolerance reflected growing unease at brutality and mistrust often directed at dark-complexioned people from the Caucasus or ex-Soviet states to the south or in Central Asia, according to Reuters.

But more than 40,000 Muslims took to the streets in huge demonstrations in 20 major cities on September 7 to denounce the bloodbath.