NEWSLINK: The Caucasus Emirate Goes Global
(The Caucasus Emirate Goes Global – Stratfor.com – Gordon Hahn – Dr. Gordon M. Hahn is Senior Associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. – www.stratfor.com/other-voices/caucasus-emirate-goes-global)
Gordon Hahn writes on the influences of international Islamic terrorism upon unrest in the Caucasus:
For a decade almost all observers ignored, downplayed, and obfuscated an ugly truth about ‘separatists’ in Chechnya and the North Caucasus: they have long been a jihadist organization allied with Al Qa`ida (AQ), its affiliates, and the larger global jihadi revolutionary alliance AQ inspired. The ‘jihadization’ of the Chechen and Caucasus mujahedin began in the mid-1990s and culminated in October 2007 with the formation of the ‘Caucasus Emirate’ (CE) in place of the radically nationalist ‘Chechen Republic of Ichkeriya’ and the CE’s declaration of jihad against not just Russia but the U.S., Britain, Israel and “any country fighting Muslims anywhere around the world,” as CE amir Dokku Umarov warned.
The CE follows and propagandizes the same radical Salafi jihadist theo-ideology professed by AQ and its affiliates without becoming one of them. CE websites began to contain the very same propaganda and training materials found on AQ and its affiliates’ websites. This year, Umarov included the U.S. among the “unclean ones” who need to be swept from the earth.
But beyond conflict and violence in the Caucasus, concerns are raised about globalization, back out from the Caucasus, of terrorism aimed at far-flung targets, such as Western Europe, with Chechen Islamists also infiltrating rebel groups in Syria:
In August, Spanish and French police foiled an AQ plot by two Chechens Eldar Magomedov and Mohamed Ankari Adamov and a Turk, Cengiz Yalcin, to drop bombs on British and U.S. targets in Spain, France and/or elsewhere in Europe during the London Summer Olympic Games using using paragliders or large toy planes or ‘drones.’ All three suspects were said to be AQ operatives, who had undergone training in Pakistan. Both Russian and U.S. authorities linked the Chechen Magomedov with international terrorist organizations and alleged he had been trained in Pakistan and Afghanistan in 2010. The CE maintains close ties and conducts personnel exchanges with several AQ-tied groups based in Waziristan, Pakistan. Magomedov was described by police sources as one of AQ’s leading operatives in Europe. Western intelligence services regard him as “one of the most dangerous members of Al Qaeda” dispatched to Europe with a mission “to commit terrorist attacks.” Although it remained unclear whether the Magomedov and Adamov were originally CE members, it is highly likely that they were. If not, then they were certainly inspired by the CE jihad to link up with AQ.
There also have been several apparent Chechen lone wolves arrested and convicted on terrorist charges in Europe in recent years, though it cannot be excluded that they were dispatched by the CE to Europe originally, perhaps, for purposes such as fundraising and recruiting. In July 2010, five Chechens were arrested in Le Mans, France on suspicion of plotting terrorist attacks. In December 2010, Lors Dukaev accidentally detonated a bomb he was working on in a Copenhagen hotel. He was arrested and in 2012 convicted by a Danish court to 12 years in prison for plotting to attack the Danish newspaper that published 12 caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad in 2005.
The CE’s globalization is also evident in the Syrian civil war, as several CE-tied groups have joined the jihadists fighting for the Syrian rebels against the Bashar Assad regime. A Chechen jamaat of some 40 fighters under amir Abu Omar al-Shishani (al-Chechen) is fighting in Aleppo. Another combat jamaat from the CE’s UVKBK, the ‘Katibatu mukhadzhirin’ Jamaat, is fighting in Sham. Even an ethnic Tatar group, the ‘Bulgar Jamaat’, has reportedly left Waziristan to fight in Syria while deciding whether or not to return to Tatarstan and help extend the CE’s reach to Russia’s Volga and Urals areas.
The CE is a serious emerging global threat. …
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