Wahhabist Terror strikes Tatarstan

Today, unknown assailants have attacked two outspoken critics of Wahhabi/Salafist Islam in Kazan, capital of the Russian republic of Tatarstan. Valiulla Yakupov, Tatarstan’s Deputy Mufti, was shot and killed as he left his home, whilst elsewhere in the city the Chief Mufti himself - Ildus Fayzov – was seriously injured as a car bomb tore his vehicle apart. Although nobody has yet claimed responsibility for these attacks, it is a near certainty that they were perpetrated by Salafist militants, angered by the efforts of these two men to combat a growing trend towards Quranic literalism and the call for violent Jihad that has been gaining traction in the republic. It seems symbolic that the attacks took place upon the eve of Ramadan, as if emphasising that the attackers regarded them as false Muslims. 

Valiulla Yakupov

 Izvestia reports that “Spetsnaz are conducting an operation to detain the presumed killers” and reveals some interesting background information on the two victims. Fayzov only took up his position in April 2011, succeeding Gusman Iskhakov who, according to “the unofficial version” was held to be “leading an insufficiently rigorous policy in relation the republic’s radical Islamists”, whereas Fayzov “took a hard-line and principled position on this question.” Fayzov and Yakupov in this respect were cast from the same mould, and shortly before his death, Yakupov told the paper that he was “alarmed at the growing influence of followers of radical currents of Islam amongst the republic’s Muslims.” He believed that these influences were primarily of foreign origin, stating: “Dozens of people go abroad, who then return to the republic and act as influential agents: actually recruiting new people and sending them abroad.”

There thus seems to be a clear motive for the attacks, with the Islamists wishing to use violence to silence those who advocate a peaceful interpretation of Islam, with a view to further radicalising and polarising the situation within Tatarstan. However, although Yakupov and many others have made reference to a very real foreign role in generating this phenomenon, there is also the Caucasus to take into consideration, which has acted as an incubator for Salafist radicalism these past two decades. Self-styled ‘Emir’ Doku Umarov has been attempting to create what he terms a “Caucasian Emirate” and, according to Nezavisimaia gazeta, has also called for “mujahideen” to “resettle in the Volga region so as to call local Muslims to jihad.”  The Chechen Islamist also wishes for Tatarstan to secede from Russia and to become part of a “Greater Caucasian Emirate”. Such people are said to have settled in Tatarstan and are playing an active role in pushing Salafism, with the consequence that experts now believe that no less than 10 of Kazan’s 50 mosques now effectively lie in their hands.

As outlined on this blog last year, officials in Tatarstan have grown increasingly worried about the growth of violent Islamist militancy for quite some time, as reflected in a piece on the republic run by Nezavisimaia gazeta entitled ‘A whole Generation of Extremists’, for it is amongst the younger generation in particular that Salafism is exerting the greatest appeal. This revealed that a considerable number of individuals had visited Pakistan and Afghanistan where they participated in violent jihadist activity before returning home with a view of attacking domestic targets.

Although Tatarstan as of 2010 had a population of 3.8 million, of which only 53.2% were Tatars (traditionally Sunni Muslims), experts consider that there are no less than 3,000 Islamist radicals in the republic, of which approximately 10% are “ready to take up arms and wage jihad, and the remainder to sponsor and help them in any way”. This figure is roughly equivalent to the number of Islamist radicals reputedly being monitored in the UK. For a territory as small as Tatarstan, this figure is quite remarkable, and today’s killings are not the first that have been perpetrated by jihadists on its soil. In November 2010, three Islamist militants believed to have planted a bomb beneath the car belonging to the Director of Tatarstan’s branch of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) Centre for Countering Extremism, were tracked down and killed in Nurlat’skii District. In the five-year period leading up to 2011, more than 100 people in Tatarstan had been sentenced for their involvement in terrorist and extremist activity.

Whereas in the past the version of Islam encountered amongst the Tatars has been of a relatively mild variety, the example of the effective displacement of traditional Sufism and other forms of Islam by Salafism in the Caucasus, seems unfortunately to point the way forward for Tatarstan, where young Muslims have increasingly taken to mimicking the fashions of the militants from the Caucasus, so much so, that many young Tatar nationalists have erroneously appropriated this alien cultural form as a signifier of their identity. Although therefore Kazan may lie far away and be practically unknown to most of us, this particular problem, born ultimately of Saudi oil wealth, is one shared with many other countries. Today’s attacks provide a sad and salutary reminder, that the malign influence of Salafist ideology is not yet on the wane, but rather, very much on the offensive and making significant inroads. 

Suspected Minsk Metro Bomber detained in violent Confrontation with Police

Viktor Dvorakovskii, an ethnic Russian Wahhabist convert and prime suspect for the 11 April bombing of the Oktiabr'skaia Minsk Metro station, has been arrested in the settlement of Inozemtsevo in the southern Russian district of Stavropol. The 23-year-old Dvorakovskii, who was born in Dagestan in the city of Makhachkala, became a convert to ‘radical Islam’ at the age of 20, and has been evading the Russian special services since they began searching for him in March after he accidentally blew up his own flat with an improvised explosive device. His wife and three-year-old child were in the flat at the time and were wounded.

Viktor Dvorakovskii: the Minsk Metro Bomber?

(Picture: Itar-TASS)

According to Izvestiia, last night’s detention of Dvorakovskii occurred quite by chance when a local police patrol spotted a man behaving in a suspicious manner who then attempted to hide himself in some bushes next to a kindergarten. Upon being asked for his identity documents, he threatened to blow up the police and promptly threw a bomb at them which landed to the side of the group concussing one of the officers. The patrol opened fire and a second device exploded blowing off Dvorakovskii’s right hand. A local resident told reporters how she heard Dvorakovskii yell “Allahu Akbar” before the sounds of two detonations rent the night air. At the time of writing, the latest reports stated that he lay comatose in hospital, bearing wounds sustained from the second bomb blast and a number of small-arms rounds. What was left of his right hand was amputated by surgeons.

At the time of his arrest it was thought that Dvorakovskii was planning an imminent suicide attack, albeit a relatively small-scale one. Recently, it had been thought that he was already dead, following a suicide bombing in Makhachkala on 10 May this year. This took place in similar circumstances to last night’s encounter, with a police patrol happening upon a man “acting suspiciously” who then detonated an explosive device killing one of the officers. Dvorakovskii, who is reported as having received paramilitary training alongside other jihadists in the northern Caucasus, is also said to have had links with a number of other perpetrators of Islamic terrorist acts in Russia, including another ethnic Russian Wahhabist – Vitalii Razdobud’ko – who was responsible for the Domodedovo Airport bombing as well as a double suicide bombing alongside his wife in Gubden, Dagestan on 14 February this year. This bombing killed three policemen and wounded 26 others. Razdobud’ko, his wife Maria Khoresheva and a number of others, had also been involved in a foiled plot to bomb multiple targets in Moscow this past New Year’s Eve.

The cases of Dvorakovskii, Razdobud’ko and his wife illustrate that what lies at the root of Muslim terrorism is Islamic doctrine, not the straw men of ‘racism’ and ‘relative deprivation’ which the British mainstream media routinely wheel out by way of ‘explanation’. It is depressing that ethnic Russians find themselves under attack from this common threat, but if Dvorakovskii was indeed responsible for the Minsk bombing, it is good news indeed that he has been apprehended and now lies in a coma. The members of the Russian police patrol who tackled him must be congratulated for their bravery. May they have every success in hunting down and eliminating all others who follow this vicious jihadist ideology.

Vladikavkaz Suicide Bombing

An Islamist suicide bomber attacked the Russian city of Vladikavkaz this morning, detonating a car bomb in the city's central marketplace at 11:00 Moscow Standard Time. The market was packed and was thus transformed into a scene of carnage. Reports of casualties vary, with Izvestiia reporting 15 dead and 90 injured, whereas Nezavisimaia gazeta cites the same number of dead, but 114 wounded. Two children were amongst the fatalities. As in all such cases, the final tally of the dead is likely to rise.

Izvestiia reports that North Ossetian police have provisionally identified the bomber as a man named Archiev. Registration documents found after the explosion indicate that the car belonged to someone with the surname of Dobriev. It is not clear whether the car had been stolen.

The authorities have warned that more attacks may follow and have sealed the border between Northern Ossetia and Ingushetia. Most Ossetians are Christians, whereas the Ingush are Muslims. This is but the latest instalment in the bloody history of the region which has witnessed a growth in local Salafist activism in recent years which has amongst its aims the creation of a breakaway ‘emirate’ in the northern Caucasus region.

One of the main figures behind recent Islamist suicide attacks is Dokku Umarov, the self-styled Chechen ‘Emir of the Caucasus Emirate.’ His aim is to establish an Islamic emirate uniting the Northern Caucasus, the Krasnodar, Astrakhan and Volga regions. It is not as yet clear whether or not he or his group specifically was linked to this attack, but amongst the many incidents this year they have already staged suicide bombings in Nazran (Ingushetia), Kizlyar (Dagestan) and of course Moscow. Last November also witnessed the bombing of the Nevskii Express which links Moscow and St Petersburg.




Pictures courtesy of Reuters: