Lukin has lengthy experience with working at that Russian venue.

Speaking to Vikkeraadio's "Vikerhommik" on Monday, Lukin said in general, the Crocus City Hall is a highly secure venue, boasting its own police station and a security detail of up to 400 personnel during a full-house event.

Nevertheless, last Friday, the venue was the scene of the most severe terrorist attack to have occurred inside Russia for the past two decades.

Lukin noted his terrible shock on first hearing about the chain of events. "It was like a home venue for me; I've been there many times and organized plenty of events there."

He also expressed his bewilderment at the duration of the attack, ahead of any reaction from authorities "I'm amazed at how they were able to operate there calmly for a full 18 minutes. How can it be that nothing got done?"

The venue is "only an hour's drive from the Kremlin, essentially in the heart of Moscow," he added.

Closer inspection revealed the attackers had not utilized any particularly sophisticated methods and in fact simply entered through the main doors amid a barrage of automatic gunfire, which caused the security personnel to flee in any case, lacking sufficient equipment to deal with the situation.

The Islamic State – Khorasan Province (IS–KP), an Afghanistan-based regional affiliate ISIS, has claimed responsibility for the attack, conducted by four gunmen, all of whom are in custody in Russia.

In his years of working on projects at the Crocus City Hall, the level of security sometimes proved a headache, Lukin added. This included one member of a Finnish rock band having to wait outside the concert venue until his passport was retrieved.

Even ahead of Friday's tragedy, some US artists have proven reluctant to perform in the region, Lukin said.

"They might still venture to go to Germany, but Poland is already considered practically a war zone for them," he said. "More recently, we've had significant difficulties getting major artists to come east."

The rest of the interview dealt with some of Lukin's reminiscences about working with Belarusian-Russian alternative rock band Bi-2, due to perform in Tallinn this year. This included a "purely political action orchestrated by the Russian embassy" in which the band was placed under arrest while in Thailand earlier this year.

"It took several days for them to decide whether to extradite the band to Russia or not, but ultimately, diplomats from Israel and Australia managed to arrange for them to board a plane at Bangkok airport which went to Tel Aviv, instead of getting on one to Moscow."

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