2024-03-29 17:07 United News Network turned the corner and said that Moscow’s Crocus Concert Hall was attacked by a terrorist attack on the 22nd. The picture shows the interior of the concert hall that was burned by the fire.Photo/Associated Press
Text/Wang Yingzhi
A shooting at the Crocus City Hall in Moscow, Russia, occurred on the evening of the 22nd, killing at least 133 people. The Amaq Agency, the official media of the terrorist organization Islamic State (IS), claimed responsibility for the crime. U.S. intelligence agencies also pointed out that the attacker was the “Islamic State Khorasan Province” (ISKP/IS-K), the branch of IS in Central Asia.
However, Russian President Vladimir Putin insisted that Ukraine planned or was involved in the terrorist attack, but made no mention of IS. Russian officials believe that Western countries, Ukrainians and Tajik immigrants jointly planned the attack in order to provoke ethnic conflicts in Russia, and pro-government media also strongly promoted this view. Why does Putin say this? What reason does the Central Asian branch of the Islamic State have to attack Russia? What is the connection between Central Asia and the Russia-Ukraine war? This article will use Q&A mode to quickly sort out the doubts related to the Moscow terrorist attack.
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Q: Was it really done by the Islamic State?
In addition to the first statement, Amagha News Agency later issued three consecutive statements, emphasizing that he was the perpetrator, and attached evidence, including photos of the four suspects taken in front of the IS flag, and the attacker The “first-person perspective” crime video recorded by the chest camera, as well as a detailed report on the attack process, etc. According to the analysis of anti-terrorism experts, the contents of these statements are consistent with the past style of IS in terms of writing style and word choice.
The IS statement said: “Four martyrs of the Caliphate attacked Christians with machine guns and knives, causing an explosion in the concert hall, causing the death and injury of at least 300 infidels.”
As for the message that the IS organization itself wants to leave to Russia, it is: “Let the Russian Crusaders and their allies know that the jihadists have not forgotten revenge.”
Russian media have reported in the past that IS terrorist attack plans have been uncovered several times in recent months. Basically, it should be credible that the main perpetrators of the attacks were IS-related units.
There was a terrorist attack on the Moscow Concert Hall. In addition to shooting at the crowd, the suspect also set off explosives, causing the concert hall to be almost completely burned down. …
Q: Why does Putin insist that terrorist organizations are related to Ukraine?
When it comes to Russian terrorists in the past, the more “old” ones are usually Chechen separatists. The Chechen Republic has always been very eager to break away from the Russian Federation. It declared independence from the Soviet Union as early as 1991. Later, Russia fought two Chechen wars with Chechnya and took Chechnya back very forcefully.However, there are still many separatists in Chechnya. Especially from the 1990s to the 2010s, they often launched terrorist attacks against the Russian government or the President of Chechnya.Kadyrov(Ramzan Kadyrov) expressed dissatisfaction.
Kadyrov is Putin’s loyal subordinate and puppet president. He rules brutally, monitors the Chechen people under high pressure, and has a terrible record of human rights persecution of gays and other sexual minorities. When the Russo-Ukrainian war started in 2022, Kadyrov took the lead in taking the Chechen security forces to participate in the Russo-Ukrainian war to show his loyalty. According to him, the number of “Kadyrov’s Army” is as high as 70,000.
On the other hand, in October of the same year, the Ukrainian Congress announced that it recognized the exiled Chechen Islamic government “Chechen Republic of Ichkeria” is a sovereign country and identifies the Chechen Republic led by Kadyrov as an illegally occupied territory by Russia. The exiled Chechen Islamic government is currently sending troops to participate in the Russia-Ukraine war to help Ukraine fight back against Russia, but the number is not large.
Therefore, the two factions of the Chechens have actually been involved in the Ukrainian war. It is not surprising that Putin would accuse Ukraine as soon as possible.
In addition, one of the most serious terrorist attacks in Moscow’s history: the serial bombings of Moscow apartments in 1999, which killed at least 293 people. The prime minister at that time was already Putin. Immediately after the bombing, he sent a large number of troops into Chechnya and immediately suppressed the Chechen army. Later, many analysts and conspiracy theories emerged that the bombing was probably directed and staged by the Putin government in order to have a legitimate excuse to suppress Chechnya.
Therefore, Putin has been in power for so many years. As long as there is a terrorist attack against Russia, he may intuitively believe that it was done by the Chechens. Now that the Chechens are related to Ukraine, we can understand that Putin has his own logic and context. But this does not mean that his accusations against Ukraine this time are correct. There are also conspiracy theories that this time may also be a means planned by the Putin government to divert the focus of the war, but this statement also lacks credible basis.
Q: Why did the Islamic State branch attack Russia?
The main perpetrators of this Moscow terrorist attack belong to the “Islamic State – Khorasan (IS-K)”. Khorasan is an ancient place name in Central Asia. This is an extremist organization founded in 2015. Its members are mainly Tajiks and Uzbeks. It cooperated with Al Qaeda and the Taliban in the early days, but now it has become a sworn enemy with the Taliban.
Extremist organizations in Central Asia have long regarded Russia as the main enemy of Islam. They accuse Russia of implementing oppressive policies against Muslims in the country and are especially unfriendly to immigrants. The police frequently search Muslim communities or mosques and deal with labor disputes encountered by Muslims. Or crime incidents are less of a concern. Therefore, in their public relations propaganda in recent years, Central Asian extremist organizations have often called on their supporters to launch a jihad against Putin’s “infidel regime.”
In addition, Russia joined the Syrian civil war in 2015 and helped the Assad regime counterattack Sunni armed forces, which became a key factor in the defeat of IS in Syria. Therefore, IS has planted hatred for Russia since then.Putin himself also said publicly in 2021IS has extended its tentacles into Central Asiaalso criticized the Taliban for being unable to control extremists. In fact, he should be very aware of the threat of extremist organizations in Central Asia.
In addition to hating Russia, Central Asian extremist organizations also regard other countries that do not conform to their ideology as enemies and have launched many terrorist attacks in various places. For example, in the St. Petersburg subway bombing in 2017, 14 people were killed and 45 others were injured. It was finally confirmed that the attack was carried out by the Kyrgyzstan’s “KTJ” (KTJ). The main suspect was a Kyrgyz-Russian dual citizen. There was also an attack on a Catholic church in Turkey at the end of January this year. The attacker was a Tajik and affiliated with IS-K.
Among the extremist organizations in Central Asia, the only exception is the Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP), which we used to know as “east turkestan islamic movement”, referred to as East Turkistan or East Turkestan Movement. The main members of TIP are Uyghurs. Early attacks targeted the Chinese Communist Party, but now they hope to establish a unified Uyghur state in Central Asia. TIP is a terrorist organization designated by the United Nations. The United States also designated it as a terrorist organization in the early years, but it was canceled in 2020 on the grounds that “there is no credible evidence that the East Turkestan Islamic Movement still exists.” This is of course strongly opposed by China.
The terrorist attack at the Moscow Concert Hall was confirmed to have been carried out by the terrorist organization “Islamic State Khorasan Province”. The picture shows the arrested Tajik owner…
Q: Are there many Muslim populations in Central Asia?
Central Asia mainly refers to the area from Xinjiang to the Caspian Sea, and from Afghanistan to Russia. But Central Asia in the narrow sense only includes five countries, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. These countries, plus Azerbaijan in Eastern Europe, all believe in Islam. Except for Azerbaijan, the populations of the other five countries are mainly Sunni, with Sunnis accounting for about 90%. Shiites account for 10%.
There are significant Muslim populations in the Volga-Ural region and the North Caucasus region in southern Russia. Some autonomous republics in Russia, including the Chechen Republic, the Republic of Ingushetia and the Republic of Bashkortostan, also have predominantly Muslim populations.
Q: Why does the Islamic State also have branches in Central Asia?
IS probably “emerged” around the world after the Arab Spring in 2013. The focus of international news was initially focused on traditional Arab territories such as Syria and Iraq, because that was the birthplace and headquarters of IS, and because of the Syrian civil war. The war with Iraq is the largest.
But outside of the spotlight, there are actually many IS-affiliated organizations in areas around the world with large Muslim populations. They are found in Africa and Southeast Asia, and the one closest to Taiwan may be the Philippine branch of IS. Most of them are Muslim armed groups that already exist in the local area. Because they agree with IS’s philosophy and want to gain IS’s resources and reputation, they choose to be loyal to IS and become their affiliated organizations.
You can think of terrorist organizations as gangsters. They rob each other of people and resources. Organization A often merges with organization B, or organization C splits into D and E, etc., such as bin Laden’s Al Qaeda and IS. The competitive relationship has been discussed in many news before. This is why terrorist organizations rush to admit after committing a crime, because they need to show off their firepower in front of their “fellow terrorists” to attract more people’s loyalty and attract more capital inflows.
Q: How do Central Asian Muslims join IS?
In addition to establishing groups in their hometowns and then defecting to IS, extremists also praise so-called “hijrah” operations. The original meaning of Hijrah in Islam is that when the place where you live is not suitable for practicing Islamic beliefs, such as the government does not allow it, etc., Muslims will be encouraged to move to a more suitable country to fulfill their obligations as a good Muslim.
But in the minds of extremists, migration to fight jihad is also a kind of hijrah. Therefore, during the heyday of IS, between 2014 and 2016, many Muslims in Europe, America, Central Asia, and North Africa were “inspired” to go to Syria or The Iraqi frontline becomes part of IS.
For information on how foreign fighters join IS and what life is like after joining, you can refer to the two articles “ISIS Foreign Soldiers’ Notes I: Registration, New Training, and Signing” and “ISIS Foreign Soldiers’ Notes” written by Zhang Zhenhong, the former editor-in-chief of Zhuanjiao, in 2015. II: Processing for desertion, discharge, and return home. These two very interesting articles should be very interesting to boys who have served in the military.
Although these two articles are about European and American foreign fighters, they should also be applicable to Muslims in Central Asia. Reports at the time also found that Muslims in Central Asia are usually more uncomfortable with the situation of IS because they are usually poorer and do not understand the language compared to European and American fighters. Syria speaks Arabic, while Central Asia mostly speaks Russian and Turks. or Persian, so they are often looked down upon by IS officials or local members.
But in any case, at least 8,500 Central Asians went to the Middle East to join IS, and later returned to their homeland with their IS experience, allowing the terrorist organization to spread.
ISIS has branches around the world. In its heyday, many foreigners flew directly to Syria or Iraq to join Islam…
▌Continued from the next article: “Q&A on the IS-K terrorist attack in Moscow (2): The grievances between Russia and extremist organizations in Central Asia? 〉
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2024-03-29 09:07:17
