Paying for terror in Russia

(Moscow News – themoscownews.com – Anna Arutunyan – November 14, 2013) On November 2, President Vladimir Putin signed a controversial law changing Russia’s anti-terrorism legislation, enabling law enforcement authorities to confiscate the property of relatives of anyone who has committed a terror attack. The Moscow News has asked five experts to weigh in on whether the law will work and what its potential consequences are.

What does the law say?

The law, the draft of which Putin introduced into parliament in September, institutes a range of measures, like targeting terrorist training camps. But here’s the bit that’s got everybody talking:

“The reimbursement of damages, including moral damages, incurred as a result of a terrorist act, will… come at the expense of persons who committed the act, as well as at the expense of close relatives… and persons close to the [perpetrators], given that there is enough basis to assume that the money, valuables or other property have been obtained as a result of terrorist activity or are the income from such property.”

How will the law be applied?

According to Ernest Valeyev, deputy chairman of the State Duma Security Committee, which supported the bill in parliament, investigators and judges ultimately determine whom the law will affect.

“There will be a criminal investigation to identify relatives who got material gain from terrorist activity,” Valeyev said. “Based on the criminal investigation, prosecutors will file a suit in court against those who benefited materially from terrorist activity. These must be relatives or persons who had close relations with the terrorist.”

People co-habiting with an alleged terrorist – as well as common-law spouses – could be affected, Valeyev added.

How is income from terrorist activity identified?

“This mechanism is spelled out in our anti-corruption legislation,” Valeyev said. “In anti-corruption legislation, when a relative (and the circle is narrower in those cases) cannot explain where [particular income] came from, then there is a suit targeting that income specifically.”

The burden of proof, thus, falls on whoever it is that is accused of being a terrorist’s relative.

“The source of the income must be explained by the person who owns it. This does not violate the presumption of innocence because it is a civil suit, where each side proves its position,” Valeyev said. “If [the owner] cannot prove that his income is legal, it can be confiscated.”

But Gennady Gudkov, a veteran security officer and former member of the Duma Security Committee who has since joined the opposition, believes that the clause on income source makes the law meaningless.

“I don’t know of any case where terrorist activity generates revenue,” he said. “Terrorism is not a business, it’s a way of fighting for power.”

Will this law deter suicide bombers?

“A lot of Muslims have told me that among those who have decided to commit a suicide attack, things like family have no meaning anymore, [the person] is in a different psychological state,” said security expert Sergei Goncharov, a former deputy commander of the elite Alpha counter-terrorism unit and president of the Alpha Veterans’ Association. “On the other hand, the clause could serve as an incentive for family members to try to convince the potential attacker to change his course.”

Others say that families are not likely to deter potential suicide bombers.

“The impact would fall short of the authorities’ expectations if only because, as history of terrorism in Russia shows, some of the terrorists, including many of the would-be suicide bombers, severed ties with their families before joining terrorist and insurgency networks,” said Simon Saradzhyan, a security expert at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University.

“Some of the would-be ‘black widows’ had become ‘black sheep’ in their families long before beginning to contemplate acts of terrorism,” Saradzhyan added. “Some of them became outcasts because of behavior their relatives deemed as immoral, becoming easy prey for terrorist recruiters.”

According to Saradzhyan, some would-be terrorists grow so fundamentalist in their beliefs that they fall out with their more secular relatives. “In short, there may simply be no close relative available… to dissuade such a person,” he concluded.

Won’t innocent people now be held responsible?

“This is a good and necessary law,” Goncharov said. “But there is concern that given the corruption we have in the North Caucasus, it could wind up bringing more harm than good.”

In theory, the clarification that property can only be seized if obtained through terrorist activity should deter law enforcement from arbitrary confiscation, but that may not always be the case in reality.

“People could use this law to settle scores,” Goncharov said. “Say someone has a nice house. A security official who has power over him could turn him into an ‘organizer’ or ‘relative’ of an organizer of terrorist activity and confiscate it.”

Has this worked in other countries?

Proponents of the law say that similar measures have been effective in countries like Israel. But critics say attempts to hold relatives responsible for terror attacks have not met success abroad.

“[Israeli security forces would] destroy the houses of terrorists, but this policy did not last very long because it was not proven empirically that it reduced terrorism,” said Ely Karmon, a senior research scholar at the Israel-based Institute for Counter-Terrorism.

According to Karmon, terrorist organizations would offset such destruction by sending money directly to terrorists’ families – so there was ultimately no deterrent factor.

While he said that some families pressed their children not to engage in terrorist activities, in some cases the measure backfired.

“The shock of seeing their houses bulldozed gave [terrorists’ relatives] psychological support from their communities and in some cases financial aid from terrorist organizations like Hamas,” Karmon said.