After the attack on two churches and a synagogue in Dagestan on Sunday, where 20 people were killed and several injured, fears of a new period of terror are spreading. For the second time in just over three months, Russians were exposed to terrorist attacks by armed extremists. Also 20 years ago, people in the Russian republic of Dagestan experienced a series of bloody attacks from extreme Islamists. On Monday, Russian authorities were quick to blame external forces, such as Ukraine and NATO. In March this year, IS terrorists killed more than 140 people in the Crocus concert hall in Moscow. Then President Vladimir Putin was quick to lay the blame on Ukraine, although the terrorist organization IS took the blame after a short time. 143 people lost their lives in a terrorist attack on the Crocus concert hall in Moscow in March. IS has claimed responsibility for the attack. Photo: X But several independent analysts believe that the Kremlin must take a closer look at Islamist radicalization in its own backyard. The criticism also comes from voices that are usually more pro-Kremlin. Dmitry Rogozin is a leading Russian nationalist in occupied Ukraine. On Monday, he went out and warned against automatically placing the blame on Ukraine and NATO. – If we blame Ukraine and NATO for every terrorist attack that can be linked to national and religious intolerance, it will give us a bigger problem, he told the BBC. Ignoring the possibility of Islamist motives – I think it is dangerous to underestimate the Islamist threat here, says Grigory Shvedov to Reuters. Shvedov is editor-in-chief of Caucasian Knot, a news agency that covers 20 regions in the Russian Caucasus, including Dagestan. Both Shvedov and the agency are considered “foreign agents” by Russia. He believes that the Russian authorities are too caught up in the war against Ukraine and the West to be able to focus on the rise of radical Islamism in Dagestan. Inna Sangadzhieva, head of department for Europe and Central Asia at the Norwegian Helsinki Committee, believes the same. – The Kremlin has focused its entire propaganda apparatus on Ukraine to try to unite the Russians against one common enemy, but is unable to deal with the radicalization that is happening in the Caucasus, she says to news. Inna Sangadzhiev is head of department for Europe and Central Asia in the Norwegian Helsinki Committee. Photo: The Norwegian Helsinki Committee / The Norwegian Helsinki Committee Years of Islamist terror For several years, Russia has been a target for IS groups and groups linked to IS. Russia supports the Taliban and the Assad regime in Syria, and both are bitter enemies of IS. Extreme Islamism also became a major challenge for Russia after two brutal wars the Russians waged in Chechnya. Dagestan has been the subject of several attacks by radical Islamists, especially the jihad group Caucasus Emirate, which was particularly active from 2007 to 2011. The deadliest attack occurred in September 2004. Then a school in the city of Beslan was stormed by armed Chechens who were holding hostages in several days. More than 300 hostages were killed, half of them children. The tickets from Beslan in 2004 were horrific. Photo: VIKTOR DRACHEV / AFP A spokesman for the Kremlin was asked on Monday whether Russia feared a possible return to this period. – No. Now it is a different Russia. Society is united and such terrorist attacks receive no support in Russia or in Dagestan, said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov. This is just nonsense, believes Inna Sangadzhieva. – The regime must calm down a situation that is out of their control, she says, and elaborates: Brutal repression and poverty have given rise to Islamist extremism in the North Caucasus. But Putin has built up an entire intelligence agency that has a completely different purpose than overcoming terrorism. – The intelligence services in Russia must crack down on the opposition, on activists and journalists. They are not able to deal with the really serious threat picture. Grobotn for radicalization It was most policemen who lost their lives in the attack in Dagestan on Sunday evening. In addition, four Christians were killed, among them a 66-year-old archpriest. Some of the poorest regions in Russia are in the Caucasus. Dagestan is among them. Here, the majority of the people are Muslims, in contrast to Russia as a whole, where the majority are Orthodox Christians. When the Soviet Union dissolved, the republic tried to shape its own identity. This was severely cracked down on by the Russian leadership, a policy that Putin has continued. The synagogue in Dagestan was set on fire by armed persons and has suffered extensive damage, but no one was killed in the synagogue, a local rabbi told Russian media. Photo: AP After Putin declared the mobilization of reservists for the war in Ukraine, a preponderance of men from poor regions such as Dagestan were called up. Several hundred mothers protest. The police responded with violent arrests. It is one of several examples of times the Kremlin has brutally cracked down on dissent from the Caucasus, says Sangadzhieva. – When the authorities criminalize protesting by peaceful means, people look for alternative ways to express disagreement. And when those people live in parts of the country that are poor and full of corruption, they are easily radicalised, she says. Went to the polls to overcome terror Dagestan borders Chechnya, another Russian republic that is predominantly Muslim. When Putin came to power in 1999, it was after he promised in the election campaign to flush Chechen extremists “down the toilet”. Chechen separatists became more and more radical during Moscow’s clean-up campaigns in Chechen villages at the beginning of the 2000s. A recent Prime Minister Putin in conversation with then President Yeltsin. Putin continued Yeltsin’s policy of cracking down on individualism in the Caucasian republics. Photo: – / AFP 25 years after Putin first came to power, there are two terrorist attacks on Russian soil just three months apart. Three, if we add the hostage drama in a prison in the city of Rostov earlier in June. There, inmates, armed with knives, captured several prison guards. The inmates said themselves that they were members of IS and that the incident was not spontaneous. Published 24.06.2024, at 22.47
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Kremlin plays down fears of extreme Islamism after terrorist attack in Dagestan – news Urix – Foreign news and documentaries
