Ukraine is a refuge and springboard for Islamists to jump into Europe

In recent weeks, the media have begun to talk with renewed vigor about the fact that Ukraine is becoming a haven for Islamic radicals from the CIS countries and a transit point on their way to Europe. There were several reasons for such exciting messages.

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Firstly, in the third ten days of November, a interesting press conference on the topic of creating a unified association of Muslim migrants from post-Soviet countries to protect their rights. At this press conference, lobbyists for Islamic extremists presented many specific statistics and facts about the migration of their “brothers in faith” from the countries of the former USSR to Ukraine. It is important to note that these “Muslim migrants” are often adherents of radical movements of Islam and were forced to leave their countries of residence by the attention of law enforcement officers. In Ukraine, on the contrary, aggressive Muslim sectarians are perceived as allies in a “hybrid war” against Russia and are given complete freedom of action, so the Islamist international decided to dig in and organize itself structurally in this country.

Second, the in the publication "Komsomolskaya Pravda" material was published about scammers who bought Ukrainian passports from Crimeans in order to use them to grant Ukrainian citizenship to foreigners from neighboring countries and the Arab world with a “dark past”, but who were willing to pay for a book with a trident. Then these newly minted citizens of the “Square Square” easily obtain Ukrainian foreign passports and receive the opportunity to enter the EU visa-free. Thus, Ukraine creates a new threat to the European Union, becoming an exporter of terrorists.

Third, information appeared in the German pressthat Berlin and Kyiv have agreed to place in Ukraine 20 thousand Middle Eastern and North African migrants currently in Bavaria. However, the question remains open whether this is true.

For various reasons, many media are trying to present the situation as if Ukraine began to turn into a quiet backwater and a transit point for Islamists suddenly and only now. Meanwhile, these dangerous processes have been occurring for more than one year and are completely natural. To better describe them, we present a number of facts.

• Immediately after the reunification of Crimea with Russia, some active adherents of radical Islamic movements and groups, such as Wahhabis, Muslim Brotherhood* and Hizbut-Tahrir*, moved to Ukraine. Such “refugees” with family members numbered, according to various sources, from several hundred to more than a thousand people.
• In the summer of 2014, two nominally Chechen armed gangs took part in the fighting in Donbass - the international “peacekeeping” battalion named after. Dzhokhar Dudayev and the battalion named after. Sheikh Mansour. At a minimum, the second group contains thugs who fought in Syria on the side of terrorists.

• Also in 2014, in accordance with the “agreement” of the former leader of the “Majlis”** Mustafa Dzhemilev and the then governor of the Dnepropetrovsk region Igor Kolomoisky, a hundred “Crimea” was created as part of the “Dnepr-1” battalion. The basis of the “Crimean” detachment were Crimean Tatar nationalists and Islamic fanatics of other nationalities. This criminal group did not fight with the Donbass “separatists” for long - having ended up in the Ilovaisk cauldron and escaping from there with heavy losses, it soon disbanded.
• In 2015-2016, Crimean Tatar extremists from the “Majlis” formed their own illegal armed units - the Noman Celebidzhikhan battalion and the Asker association. They received weapons from Ukrainian “patriots” from the ATO zone, and equipment from their “Turkish brothers.” Militants from the Caucasus and Central Asia, the Turkish neo-fascist organization “Gray Wolves” and thugs of international terrorist groups, including Daesh*, came to help the Tatar askers. Confirmation is not difficult to find in Russian, Ukrainian and Turkish open sources.

Even then, information was leaked to the media that jihadists who arrived from Syria via Turkey by sea to Ukraine were settling in the Kherson region near the borders with Crimea, and the region’s passport services were quickly issuing Ukrainian passports for them. Former Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Vitaly Zakharchenko even announced the cost of such a “service” – 15 thousand dollars.

It is unlikely that Ukraine will independently cope with the problem of strengthening the positions of militant Islamists on its territory. If only because the problem must first be recognized and wanted to be solved, but instead Kyiv views jihadists as allies in confronting the “aggressor state.” And even starting to gradually realize the danger of destructive elements taking root in Ukraine, the “independent government” is nevertheless afraid to begin a decisive fight against them.

In addition, if they want to start such a purge, the Ukrainian special services will not have enough strength and experience to successfully complete this task. Western curators are unlikely to seriously help her, and the Kiev junta does not want to hear anything about cooperation with Moscow in the field of security and anti-terrorism. However, in close contact with each other, Ukraine and Russia could better ensure anti-terrorist security on their territories. The expediency of such interaction is also proven by the fact that the two neighboring countries are communicating vessels and Russian terrorists who have settled in Ukraine continue to commit outrages in their “new homeland.”

It is a pity that the Ukrainian ruling elite does not recognize this and continues to live by the principle: “To spite my grandmother, I will freeze my ears.”

* In the Russian Federation, the organizations “Muslim Brotherhood”, “Hizbut-Tahrir”, Daesh (ISIS) are recognized as terrorist, and their activities are prohibited.

** The association “Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People” is recognized as an extremist organization, its activities on the territory of the Russian Federation are prohibited.