Why Russia may be in the crosshairs of Daesh extremists

Special Why Russia may be in the crosshairs of Daesh extremists
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Ambulances and vehicles of Russian emergency services are parked at the burning Crocus City Hall concert venue following a shooting incident, outside Moscow ON March 22, 2024. (REUTERS)
Special Why Russia may be in the crosshairs of Daesh extremists
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A view of the burnt Crocus City Hall after an attack on March 23, 2024. (AP)
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An electronic screen installed near the Russian Foreign Ministry headquarters displays a message in memory of the victims of the March 23, 2024 shooting attack at the Crocus City Hall concert venue in Moscow. (REUTERS)
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People lay flowers and light candles standing next to the Crocus City Hall in Moscow on March 23, 2024. (AP)
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Gunmen opened fire at the Crocus City Hall concert venue in the Moscow suburb of Krasnogorsk on March 22, 2024, killing more than 100 people and wounding scores more before a major fire spread through the building. (AFP)
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Bodybags containing dead victims are inspected by investigators looking into the March 22, 2024, Moscow concert attack. (Investigative Committee of Russia via AP)
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A view shows the Crocus City Hall concert venue following Friday's deadly attack outside Moscow on March 23, 2024. (Moscow News Agency/Handout via REUTERS)
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A still image taken from a handout video shows a gun found at the scene of the deadly shooting attack in Crocus City Hall concert venue, on March 23, 2024. (Reuters)
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Updated 24 March 2024
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Why Russia may be in the crosshairs of Daesh extremists

Why Russia may be in the crosshairs of Daesh extremists
  • Daesh affiliate claims responsibility for Moscow concert venue shooting, which killed at least 115
  • Afghanistan-based IS-K extremists have a ‘track record of attacking Russian targets,’ expert says

LONDON: Just hours after gunmen stormed a popular concert venue on the outskirts of the Russian capital Moscow on Friday night, killing 115, wounding scores and setting the building ablaze, the extremist group Daesh took to Telegram to claim responsibility.




Russian firefighters clear rubble at the Crocus City Hall concert venue after a deadly attack outside Moscow on March 23, 2024. (Russian Emergency Services Handout via REUTERS)

The group said that the attack was executed by its Afghan branch, IS-K, or Islamic State in Khorasan Province — the same group that was behind the twin bombings in Iran in January that killed 94 people at the shrine of former Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani.

“IS-K has a track record of attacking Russian targets,” Luke Coffey, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, told Arab News. “For example, IS-K was behind the attack against the Russian embassy in Kabul in September 2022. Also, IS-K is probably not happy with the deepening relations between Moscow and the Taliban.” 




The bodies of victims killed in Daesh-claimed twin explosions that struck a crowd marking the anniversary of the 2020 killing of Guards general Qasem Soleimani, lie at a hospital in the southern Iranian city of Kerman on January 3, 2024. (ISNA/AFP)

Founded in 2015 by frustrated former members of the Pakistani Taliban who sought more violent methods to spread their extreme interpretation of Islam, IS-K has primarily operated in the ungoverned spaces of rural Afghanistan.

From this initial obscurity, IS-K shot to global attention in August 2021 amid the chaos of the Taliban’s return to power when its members bombed Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, killing more than 170 people, among them 13 US military personnel.




Smoke rises from a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 26, 2021. (AP/File)

US operations had reduced IS-K’s numbers significantly, but after the Western withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 the group renewed and grew. The Taliban is now regularly engaged in combat against IS-K, as it threatens its ability to govern.




Taliban fighters stand guard at an entrance gate of the Sardar Mohammad Dawood Khan military hospital in Kabul on November 3, 2021, a day after an attack claimed by the Taliban's hardline rivals the Islamic State-Khorasan (IS-K), in which at least 19 people were killed. (AFP/File)

Daesh and its affiliates have previously claimed responsibility for random attacks that they had no direct hand in, leading to some initial skepticism about their role in the Moscow attack. However, US intelligence has since confirmed the authenticity of the claim.

In fact, the US issued a warning to its citizens in Russia as early as March 7, highlighting “reports that extremists have imminent plans to target large gatherings in Moscow, to include concerts.”




A screenshot taken from a handout video released March 23, 2024, shows Russian crime investigators working at the scene of the Crocus City Hall attack in Krasnogorsk, Moscow region. (Handout via REUTERS)

On the same day that the US embassy in Moscow issued this warning, Commander of the US Central Command in the Middle East — CENTCOM — Gen. Michael Kurilla, told a briefing that the risk of attacks emanating from Afghanistan was increasing.

“I assess Daesh-Khorasan retains the capability and will to attack US and Western interests abroad in as little as six months and with little to no warning,” he said, according to a statement issued by the US Department of Defense.

He added: “Daesh is now strong not only in Afghanistan but outside of it as well. It now possesses the capabilities to carry out attacks in Europe and Asia, with its fighters positioned along the border with Tajikistan.”




Caption

With Russia’s security apparatus and defense infrastructure focused primarily on its war with Ukraine, extremist groups such as Daesh appear to have sensed an opportunity to stage a comeback and plot audacious attacks while governments were distracted.

“There is no doubt that Daesh is taking advantage of Russia’s distractions in Ukraine,” Coffey said. “More than two years into Russia’s invasion, the war in Ukraine probably now consumes most of the attention and resources of Russia’s intelligence agencies, armed forces, security services and even law enforcement.




Ukrainian servicemen walk next to destroyed Russian tanks and armored personnel carriers in Dmytrivka village, west of Kyiv, on April 2, 2022. Daesh militants seem to have taken advantage as Russia gets distracted with its disastrous war on Ukraine. (AFP/File)

“Daesh probably saw an opportunity to strike while Russia is weakened. In the past, Daesh publications such as Al-Naba have contained articles about the ‘crusader against crusader war’ taking place between Russia and Ukraine, even suggesting that such a war presents opportunities for them.”

MAJOR TERROR STRIKES IN RUSSIA

• October 2002 40 Chechen militants took 912 hostages in Moscow’s Dubrovka Theater.

July 2003 Two Chechen separatists committed suicide attacks at a rock concert in Moscow, killing 15 people.

February 2004 A suicide bomber killed 41 people in a Moscow subway during rush hour.

September 2004 30 Chechen militants seized a school in Beslan, North Ossetia, killing 330 people, half of whom were children.

March 2010 Two suicide bombers from the Caucasus Emirate group killed 40 people in a Moscow subway.

January 2011 A suicide bomber killed 37 people in the arrivals hall of Moscow Domodedovo airport.

October 2015 Daesh claimed responsibility for blowing up a Russian Metrojet flight over Egypt, killing all 224 passengers.

April 2017 A bomb attack on a subway train in St. Petersburg killed 16 people.

March 2024 ISIS-K, the Afghan branch of Daesh, attacked a Moscow concert hall, killing at least 115 people.

Hani Nasira, a political analyst and expert in terrorism and extremist organizations, echoed Coffey’s view that the conflict between Russia and Ukraine has created fertile ground for surprise attacks on a distracted region.

“Since the conflict in Ukraine started, IS-K has increased the flow of its fighters who have joined the war by going from their initial center of operations in Syria toward their countries of origin to relaunch operations in Northern Caucasus and Central Asian countries, such as Uzbekistan and Tajikistan,” Nasira told Arab News.




Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday vowed to punish those behind the Moscow concert hall that killed more than 130, saying four gunmen trying to flee to Ukraine had been arrested. (Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)

“The war in Ukraine constituted the starting point for the recurrence of what happened in Afghanistan, with foreign fighters from around the world joining the war alongside Ukraine against Russia, especially since the war, for the Western camp, has turned into a war of attrition with which it aims to inflict maximum losses on Russia or repeat the phenomenon of ‘returnees’ after the war is over,” he said.

“Some of the extremists of Chechen descent are fighting Russia in Ukraine to remove the humiliating stain left by the men of Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, who support Russia and were described by Daesh’s members as ‘traitors and a disgrace to the Chechen nation’ because no true Chechen would fight in the ranks of Russian President Vladimir Putin.”




In this photo taken on January 09, 1995, Chechen fighters rest beside a fire during a break in the fighting in central Grozny, capital of Chechnya. After years of war, Russian government forces eventually overcame resistance. (AFP/File)

Russia also seems to be of particular interest to IS-K because, as it claims, the Russian military has a record of killing Muslims in Chechnya, Syria and Afghanistan. 

Russia has been targeted by extremist groups numerous times over the past two decades — the Nord Ost theater siege in 2002 and the Beslan massacre in 2004 being the most notorious attacks.

For as long as the focus of its defense apparatus is dominated by the war in Ukraine, Russia may struggle to fend off further attacks by increasingly audacious extremist groups emerging from its restive south.

 


Divided G20 fails to agree on climate, Ukraine

Divided G20 fails to agree on climate, Ukraine
Updated 19 November 2024
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Divided G20 fails to agree on climate, Ukraine

Divided G20 fails to agree on climate, Ukraine
  • In a statement, the G20 called for “comprehensive” ceasefires in both Gaza and Lebanon
  • On Sunday, Biden, who is attempting to ringfence support for Ukraine before Trump’s return to power, gave Kyiv the green light to use long-range US missiles to strike deep inside Russian territory

RIO DE JANEIRO: G20 leaders failed on Monday to break a deadlock in UN climate talks at a summit in Rio that was dominated by divergences over the war in Ukraine and Donald Trump’s impending return to the White House.
Ahead of the meeting, the UN had implored the leaders of the world’s richest economies to rescue stalled climate talks in Azerbaijan by boosting funding for developing countries struggling with global warming.
G20 members, who are divided on who should pay, did not make such commitments, saying only that the trillions of dollars needed would come “from all sources.”
“The leaders are kicking the can back to Baku,” said Mick Sheldrick, co-founder of the advocacy group Global Citizen, referring to the capital of Azerbaijan where the UN climate talks are taking place.
“This is probably going to make it harder to achieve an agreement,” he told AFP.
The risk of an escalation in the war in Ukraine and the prospect of a return of US President-elect Trump’s isolationist “America First” policies also dominated the talks in Brazil.
US President Joe Biden is attending the summit, but as a lame duck eclipsed by China’s Xi Jinping, who has cast himself as a protector of the international order in the new Trump era.
Xi, who held back-to-back meetings with other leaders, warned the world faced a new period of “turbulence” and said there should be “no escalation of wars, and no fanning of flames.”
In a statement, the G20 called for “comprehensive” ceasefires in both Gaza and Lebanon.
The summit was riven with divisions over Ukraine, however.
On Sunday, Biden, who is attempting to ringfence support for Ukraine before Trump’s return to power, gave Kyiv the green light to use long-range US missiles to strike deep inside Russian territory.
Biden’s move — a major policy shift by the US — threatens to escalate a war Trump has vowed to quickly end.
Russia on Monday warned of an “appropriate response” if its territory was hit.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he would not follow Biden’s lead with his country’s Taurus missiles, but French President Emmanuel Macron praised a “good” move by Biden.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva attempted to put issues close to his heart, such as fighting hunger and climate change, at the top of the agenda.
At the opening of the summit, he launched the centerpiece of his G20 presidency: a Global Alliance against Poverty and Hunger backed by 82 countries that aims to feed half a billion people by 2030.
He won further praise from campaigners by garnering support for a bid to make billionaires pay more tax.
The summit statement included a pledge to “engage cooperatively to ensure that ultra-high-net-worth individuals are effectively taxed,” and to devise mechanisms to prevent them dodging tax authorities.
“Brazil has lit a path toward a more just and resilient world, challenging others to meet them at this critical juncture,” anti-poverty group Oxfam said in a statement.
But Lula’s progressive social agenda met some resistance from Argentina’s libertarian president Javier Milei, an ardent fan of Trump and his billionaire adviser Elon Musk.
Milei said he opposed points in the summit declaration, including increasing state intervention to combat hunger and regulating social media but saved Brazil’s blushes by nonetheless signing up to the joint statement.
The meeting comes in a year marked by another grim litany of extreme weather events, including Brazil’s worst wildfire season in over a decade, and the opening of a new front in Israel’s wars with its Arab neighbors.
“Today the world is on a knife edge,” EU Council President Charles Michel warned.
The get-together caps a diplomatic farewell tour by Biden that took him to Lima for a meeting of Asia-Pacific trading partners, and then to the Amazon in the first such visit for a sitting US president.
Conspicuously absent from the summit was Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose arrest is sought by the International Criminal Court over the Ukraine war.
 

 


Hong Kong to sentence dozens of democracy campaigners

Hong Kong to sentence dozens of democracy campaigners
Updated 19 November 2024
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Hong Kong to sentence dozens of democracy campaigners

Hong Kong to sentence dozens of democracy campaigners
  • The sentencing is “a very important indicator to show the general public (the degree of) openness and inclusivity in our society,” Lee Yue-shun, one of those acquitted, told AFP on Tuesday as he waited outside court

HONG KONG: Hong Kong’s largest national security trial will draw to a close on Tuesday, with dozens of the city’s most prominent democracy campaigners set to be sentenced for subversion, a charge that can carry up to life imprisonment.
Beijing imposed a sweeping national security law on the financial hub in 2020, snuffing out months of massive, sometimes violent, pro-democracy protests.
Western countries and international rights groups have condemned the trial as evidence of Hong Kong’s increased authoritarianism.
The “Hong Kong 47” were arrested in 2021 after holding an unofficial election primary that aimed to improve pro-democracy parties’ chances of winning a majority in the city’s legislature.
Two of the 47 were acquitted in May, but on Tuesday, the rest will learn their sentences, many after more than 1,300 days in jail.
The sentencing is “a very important indicator to show the general public (the degree of) openness and inclusivity in our society,” Lee Yue-shun, one of those acquitted, told AFP on Tuesday as he waited outside court.
A friend of defendant Gordon Ng, named by prosecutors as one of five organizers, told AFP she had been suffering insomnia in the past few days.
“Gordon seemed nervous too,” the woman said about her visit to Ng in prison. “But... he kept telling us not to overthink.”
This case is the largest by number of defendants since the law was passed in mid-2020.
Another major national security trial will see a key development on Wednesday, when jailed pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai testifies in his collusion trial.
The charges against Lai revolve around publications in his now-shuttered tabloid Apple Daily, which supported the pro-democracy protests and criticized Beijing’s leadership.
China and Hong Kong say the security law restored order following the 2019 protests, and have warned against “interference” from other countries.

At dawn on Tuesday, more than 200 people stood in the chilly drizzle outside the court where the sentencing will take place.
Some had been queuing since Saturday to nab a public seat.
Eric, an IT professional based in mainland China, spent a day of holiday waiting in line.
“I want to bear witness of how Hong Kong becomes mainland China,” Eric told AFP.
“In the future, cases like this may not be open to the public anymore.”
Jack, a law student, said he wanted to witness the sentencing because he found the judgment “was not particularly convincing.”
He said he was pessimistic that the sentencing would be lenient, but that even if it was, “people’s passion for political participation has dissipated in the face of restrictions.”
The aim of the election primary, which took place in July 2020, was to pick a cross-party shortlist of pro-democracy candidates to increase their electoral prospects.
If a majority was achieved, the plan was to force the government to meet the 2019 protesters’ demands — including universal suffrage — by threatening to indiscriminately veto the budget.
Three senior judges handpicked by the government to try security cases said the group would have caused a “constitutional crisis.”

The “principal offenders” face 10 years to life in jail.
Legal scholar Benny Tai has been named “the brain behind the project” by prosecutors.
Others singled out as “more radical” are the ex-leaders of the now-disbanded Civic Party Alvin Yeung and Jeremy Tam, young activist Owen Chow and former journalist Gwyneth Ho.
The oldest defendant is “Long Hair” Leung Kwok-hung, the 68-year-old co-founder of the city’s last standing opposition party the League of Social Democrats.
His wife Chan Po-ying, the leader of the LSD, told AFP that Leung “does not have any special thoughts on the sentence” after visiting him on Monday.
“I feel rather calm too... I wish for no surprise and no shock,” Chan said.
Emilia Wong, girlfriend of rally organizer Ventus Lau, said Lau appeared more anxious in recent months.
They hadn’t discussed the potential sentence much because “it’s an unprecedented case,” she said.
“A long time ago, he said if the sentence is up to 10 years or 20 years, I should not wait for his release,” Wong told AFP.
“The (sentencing) day may be a significant milestone for the outside world but for me... I will just have to carry on with my normal life, visiting him and handling his matters.”
 

 


Starmer stays quiet on Ukraine’s use of UK Storm Shadow missiles

Starmer stays quiet on Ukraine’s use of UK Storm Shadow missiles
Updated 19 November 2024
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Starmer stays quiet on Ukraine’s use of UK Storm Shadow missiles

Starmer stays quiet on Ukraine’s use of UK Storm Shadow missiles
  • Britain, which has provided Ukraine with Storm Shadow long-range missiles, has consistently pushed to ease restrictions on Kyiv’s use of the weapons

RIO DE JANEIRO: British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Monday said he would not “get into operational details” after US President Joe Biden gave Ukraine permission to use Western-supplied long-range missiles against Russia.
Speaking to broadcasters at the G20 in Brazil, Starmer refused to be drawn “because the only winner, if we were to do that, is (Russian President Vladimir) Putin.”
Kyiv has long sought authorization from Washington to use the powerful Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMS, to hit military installations inside Russia as its troops face growing pressure.
A US official said Washington’s major policy shift on the missiles was in response to Russia’s deployment of thousands of North Korean troops in its war effort.
Britain, which has provided Ukraine with Storm Shadow long-range missiles, has consistently pushed to ease restrictions on Kyiv’s use of the weapons.
Putin had previously warned that letting Ukraine use long-range weapons would mean NATO was “at war” with Moscow.
In parliament in London, lawmaker Roger Gale asked if Britain planned to “align with the United States” in granting Kyiv permission to use the UK-supplied missiles “as it sees fit in its own defense.”
Junior defense minister Maria Eagle said the government intended to “align with our allies” on how Ukraine “can make use of the capabilities that’s been offered” by its backers.
Starmer added: “I’ve been really clear for a long time now we need to double down.
“We need to make sure Ukraine has what is necessary for as long as necessary, because we cannot allow Putin to win this war,” he said.
Asked if he had spoken to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov at the G20, he said: “I haven’t spoken to Russia and I’ve got no plans to do so.”
Foreign Secretary David Lammy, speaking to reporters after a UN Security Council meeting in New York, also refused to discuss the use of British missiles, because it “risks operational security.”
Asked how concerned he was about the implications of Donald Trump’s presidency on the war in Ukraine, he said: “One president at a time.”
“We’re dealing with President (Joe) Biden and we are committed to putting Ukraine in the strongest possible position,” he added.


Biden in ‘historic’ pledge for poor nations ahead of Trump return

Biden in ‘historic’ pledge for poor nations ahead of Trump return
Updated 19 November 2024
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Biden in ‘historic’ pledge for poor nations ahead of Trump return

Biden in ‘historic’ pledge for poor nations ahead of Trump return
  • The outgoing leader unveiled the money for the International Development Association as he attends the G20 summit underway in Rio de Janeiro, his last time at the gathering of world leaders

RIO DE JANEIRO: US President Joe Biden announced a “historic” $4 billion pledge for a World Bank fund that helps the world’s poorest countries, the White House said Monday, before Donald Trump takes office with a new cost-cutting agenda.
The outgoing leader unveiled the money for the International Development Association as he attends the G20 summit underway in Rio de Janeiro, his last time at the gathering of world leaders.
“The president announced today that the United States intends to pledge $4 billion over three years... which is really exciting,” a senior US administration official told reporters on condition of anonymity.
The official said the pledge would not be binding on Trump’s incoming administration but said previous Republican governments had also backed top-ups for the fund.
US Deputy National Security Adviser Jon Finer earlier called the pledge “historic” and said Biden would “rally other leaders to step up their contributions.”
The International Development Association is the concessional lending arm of the World Bank and is used for some of the poorest countries in the globe, including for projects focused on climate.
During a six-day tour of South America, Biden has been trying to shore up his international legacy ahead of President-elect Trump’s return to the White House on January 20.
On Sunday he visited the Amazon rainforest in Brazil to promote his record on climate change, saying that the United States had hit its target of increasing bilateral climate financing to $11 billion a year.
Billionaire Trump has pledged to take a wrecking ball to many of Biden’s policies and has appointed tech tycoon Elon Musk as head of a commission to target what he calls federal government waste.


North Korean leader Kim meets Russian resources minister

North Korean leader Kim meets Russian resources minister
Updated 19 November 2024
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North Korean leader Kim meets Russian resources minister

North Korean leader Kim meets Russian resources minister
  • A delegation of the Russian army’s Military Academy of the General Staff arrived in Pyongyang on Monday, state media reported, while a Pyongyang city council committee delegation also left for Russia

SEOUL: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un met with Russia’s natural resources minister Alexander Kozlov on Monday, state media KCNA reported, in the latest sign of growing ties between Pyongyang and Moscow.
During the meeting, Kim said cooperation in trade, science and technology should expand for the two countries’ development and prosperity, according to the report published on Tuesday.
“It is necessary to mutually and powerfully propel the co-prosperity and development of the two countries by further promoting the inter-governmental trade, economic, scientific and technological exchange and cooperation in a more extensive and diversified way,” Kim was quoted was saying in the report.
A delegation of the Russian army’s Military Academy of the General Staff arrived in Pyongyang on Monday, state media reported, while a Pyongyang city council committee delegation also left for Russia.
The exchange between Pyongyang and Moscow came as South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol, at the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro, urged the two countries to end their military cooperation which he called illegal.
A separate column carried by KCNA on Tuesday criticized the trilateral cooperation between South Korea, the US and Japan including a summit held last week on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit in Lima, Peru.
It said such cooperation including military drills created discord and confrontation.