"extremely difficult" to believe that the Khorasan branch of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL-H) was capable of carrying out last Friday's attack on Moscow's Crocus City Hall concert hall, which killed at least 140 people.
Zaharova told reporters that the West was rushing to pin the blame on Daesh to shift it away from Ukraine and the Western governments supporting Ukraine.
"They urgently needed to find something to dispel the suspicions of the collective West, so they resorted to ISIS, pulled an ace up their sleeves, and literally a few hours after the terrorist attack, the Anglo-Saxon media began to spread precisely these versions," Zaharova said.
ISIS claimed responsibility for the massacre, while US officials said they had intelligence indicating that the attack was carried out by ISIS-H, the group's Afghanistan branch. Ukraine has also repeatedly denied any involvement in the attack.
However, Alexander Bortnikov, the head of Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB), has said that the United States, Britain and Ukraine were behind the attack.
British Foreign Secretary David Cameron responded to Russia's accusations on social media, saying "Russia's claims about the West and Ukraine in relation to the Crocus Town Hall attack are complete nonsense."
Russian President Vladimir Putin says the attack was carried out by Islamist militants, but suggests that Kiev may have played a role in the attack, which he sees as in Ukraine's interest.
According to Putin, someone on the Ukrainian side was preparing to help the attackers escape before they were captured.
However, Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko said the gunmen first tried to cross into his country, then turned back and headed for Ukraine after realizing that access to Belarus was closed.
