On July 6, law enforcement in Germany and the Netherlands arrested nine Central Asians on terrorism-related charges. In Germany, five Tajik nationals, one Kyrgyz citizen, and one Turkmenistani citizen were arrested in the Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia for allegedly creating and participating in a local terrorist organization and supporting Islamic State (IS). In the Netherlands, a married couple—a Tajik husband and Kyrgyz wife—were also arrested in Eindhoven and Breda. Both are suspected of plotting terrorist attacks, with the husband also suspected of IS membership (Kaktus Media, July 6).

Since 2022, the suspects have been collecting money for IS and running a terrorist cell in Germany. They were also probing possible places for attacks and trying to acquire weapons in that country. The Dutch and German authorities were in contact with each other during the investigations, as the suspects in the two countries collaborated in plotting attacks. All nine of the suspects arrived from Ukraine in 2022 as refugees after the Russian invasion (Asiaplus.tj, July 6). Most likely, however, they met each other in Syria or Iraq, where IS controlled vast amounts of territory between 2014 and 2019—and attracted foreign jihadists from around the world, including Central Asia.

IS is now largely defeated in Syria and Iraq. However, its members are scattered around the world and able to exploit their networks and skills to launch attacks elsewhere. The arrests in Germany and the Netherlands show that IS’s legacy lives on and its members and loyalists still present a threat to security in Europe.

Central Asian Foreign Fighters in IS ranks

Between 2011 and 2017, approximately 5,000 people from the five Central Asian states traveled to Syria and Iraq to join IS and other jihadist organizations (Kursiv Media, November 1, 2018). These foreign fighters could be divided into two contingents: the first fought within IS ranks, and the second fought in the ranks of groups linked with al-Qaeda’s affiliate, Jabhat al-Nusra. Central Asian foreign fighters in IS ranks were based around al-Raqqa in Syria and Mosul in Iraq. Perhaps the most notorious Central Asian foreign fighter was Tajik national Gulmurod Khalimov, who joined IS in 2015. Prior to joining IS, he was the head of a SWAT team in Tajikistan. Following the death of Abu Umar Shishani in 2016, he was appointed as IS’s minister of war (Kloop.kg, September 5, 2016).

IS has used and inspired its Central Asian members and sympathizers to carry out attacks in various parts of the world. Kyrgyz and Tajik nationals were reported to have been involved in the Istanbul airport attack in 2016, for example (Kloop.kg, July 5, 2016). An Uzbek national, Abdulgadir Masharipov, also carried out an attack at a nightclub in Istanbul in January 2017, killing 39 people (Tass.ru, January 8, 2017). Between 2017 and 2018, IS sympathizers and recruits from Central Asia carried out other vehicular, truck-ramming, and knife attacks in New York, Stockholm, and Tajikistan’s Khatlon province, respectively, killing and injuring dozens. These attacks demonstrated that the IS threat had moved outside of Syria and Iraq’s national borders, becoming a global security issue.

Fleeing to Ukraine and Beyond

IS’s loss of its last stronghold in Syria in 2019 presented IS members with four options: remaining in the still-unstable areas of Syria and Iraq; returning to their home countries; relocating to other theaters of conflict, such as Afghanistan; or fleeing to countries where they would be relatively safe from prosecution and could start a new life—or otherwise wait until new opportunities arose. The final option has been the most compelling for Central Asian militants.

Central Asian foreign fighters began leaving IS ranks as early as 2016, after becoming disillusioned with the organization’s excessive brutality and the perceived cynical behavior of its members. Some of these fighters traveled to Ukraine on their own, while others were deported by Turkish authorities and chose Ukraine as their destination point. [1] Either way, those who chose Ukraine perceived it as a safe haven, with many fellow Russian speakers and a sizable Muslim community into which they could readily integrate (Hromadske.ua, July 17, 2017).

However, another important factor in favor of relocating to Ukraine was the country’s porous borders and the ability to obtain fake identities with new passports (Hromadske.ua, July 17, 2017). By mid-2017, several hundred IS members had moved to Ukraine, including Georgian national Tsezar Tohosashvilli, who served as the deputy to IS’s former minister of war, Abu Umar Shishani. However, he was arrested by Ukraine’s national security service in 2019 with fake documents (Zaborona, December 2, 2020; Militant Leadership Monitor, January 3, 2020).

Conclusion

In the case of the nine Central Asians arrested in Germany and the Netherlands, residence in Ukraine allowed them to relocate to Europe as “refugees.” The fact that nationals of three different Central Asian countries established a terrorist network in Europe and plotted attacks together shows their shared past as IS members continued after the fall of IS’s “territorial caliphate.” Such Central Asian IS veterans may be relatively few in number, but still present a threat to European security from the shadows.

Source: James Town

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The parties agreed to conclude an intergovernmental contract on the exemption of holders of diplomatic and service passports from visa requirements. They also agreed to intensify cooperation in the fields of tourism and agriculture.

The consultation meeting was chaired by Director for Europe Battungalag Ganhaich from the Mongolian side, and Director for Asia and the Pacific Karin Mössenlechner from the Netherlands.

Secretary of State Ankhbayar Nyamdorj received representatives of the Foreign Ministry of the Netherlands after the meeting.

In addition to discussing the expansion of relations and cooperation between the two countries, the Secretary of State presented Mongolia’s long-term and medium-term development policy, as well as its foreign policy goals. He also expressed desire to cooperate with the Netherlands in this context on a mutually beneficial basis.

Source: Akipress

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The governments of Tajikistan and the Netherlands are in the midst of hosting the March 22-24 UN water summit in New York where experts will warn delegates that the world is facing an imminent water crisis – demand for fresh water is expected to outstrip supply by 40% by the end of this decade.

Water is an ever-increasing worry for Tajikistan. Disputes over water rights are one reason why the country has been embroiled in several armed clashes with neighbour Kyrgyzstan during post-Soviet times. Tajikistan is also among the Central Asian nations threatened by warming winters and shrinking glaciers that cause erratic and declining water supplies from the mountains. In fact, researchers say climate change is causing rapid melting of glaciers right across the ‘Third Pole’ – the Tibetan Plateau that is home to the largest global store of frozen water outside of the north and south polar regions – disrupting regional water distribution. The Third Pole functions as a complex water distribution system that delivers the life-giving liquid to multiple countries, including parts of Afghanistan, China, India, Kyrgyzstan, Nepal, Pakistan and Tajikistan. 

A new worry for Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan is a decision by Afghanistan’s Taliban regime to push ahead with a major canal and irrigation scheme that could deplete water resources the trio draw from the Amu Darya border river. Iran is also involved in tense exchanges with the Taliban over river water rights in a border area, while an irate and water-stressed Iraq this week persuaded neighbour Turkey to release extra water flows from a dammed reservoir for at least one month.

At the UN 2023 Water Conference, experts are making the case that governments must urgently stop subsidising the extraction and overuse of water that is triggered by misdirected agricultural subsidies. A landmark report on the economics of water will be introduced as scientists urge nations to start managing water as a global common good, given how most countries are highly dependent on neighbours for key water supplies. It will outline how industries ranging from mining to manufacturing must be made to overhaul wasteful practices.

The report – Turning the Tide, A Call to Collective Action, by the Global Commission on the Economics of Water – is highly significant in that this is the first time that the global water system has been scrutinised comprehensively. Its value to individual countries, and the risks posed to their prosperity if the issue of water is neglected, is outlined in clear terms. As with the Stern review of the economics of the climate crisis in 2006 and the Dasgupta review of the economics of biodiversity in 2021, the report authors aim to highlight the water crisis in a way that policymakers and economists can easily deal with.

Johan Rockstrom, the director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and co-chair of the Global Commission on the Economics of Water, and a lead author of the report, last week told the Guardian that the world’s neglect of water resources was leading to disaster. “The scientific evidence is that we have a water crisis. We are misusing water, polluting water, and changing the whole global hydrological cycle, through what we are doing to the climate. It’s a triple crisis.”

The report sets out seven calls to action on water:

• Manage the global water cycle as a global common good, to be protected collectively and in our shared interests.
   
• Ensure safe and adequate water for every vulnerable group, and work with industry to scale up investment in water.
   
• Stop underpricing water. Proper pricing and targeted support for the poor will enable water to be used more efficiently, more equitably, and more sustainably
   
• Reduce the more than $700bn of subsidies in agriculture and water each year, which often fuel excessive water consumption, and reduce leakage in water systems.
   
• Establish “just water partnerships” which can mobilise finance for low- and middle-income countries.
   
• Take urgent action this decade on issues such as restoring wetlands and depleted groundwater resources;, recycling the water used in industry; moving to precision agriculture that uses water more efficiently; and having companies report on their “water footprint”.
   
• Reform the governance of water at an international level, and including water in trade agreements. Governance must also take into account women, farmers, indigenous people and others in the frontline of water conservation.

Addressing the water crisis is fundamental to fixing the climate crisis and global food crisis. “There will be no agricultural revolution unless we fix water,” Rockstrom was also cited as saying, adding: “Behind all these challenges we are facing, there’s always water, and we never talk about water.”

The report from the Global Commission on the Economics of Water warns: “We are seeing the consequences [around the world] not of freak events, nor of population growth and economic development, but of having mismanaged water globally for decades. As the science and evidence show, we now face a systemic crisis that is both local and global.

“Our collective actions have pushed the global water cycle out of balance for the first time in human history, wreaking increasing damage on communities everywhere. Further, countries are interconnected not only through transboundary rivers or streams of groundwater, but also through atmospheric flows of water vapour. And dangerously, we face water’s deepening connection with climate change and the loss of biodiversity, with each reinforcing the other.

“We can only fix this collectively. And if we move with urgency.”

Source : Intellinews

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