Aggressive jihadist propaganda threatens the security of neighboring countriesThe strengthening of the propaganda of the terrorist organization "IG-Khorasan" (banned in the Russian Federation), the recruitment of militants and the collection of funds for subversive activities can have serious consequences for the security of countries in the Afghan-Pakistani region and beyond.
Since the militants of the radical Islamist movement "Taliban" (banned in the Russian Federation) seized Kabul in August 2021, the terrorist group "IG-Khorasan" has expanded and intensified propaganda in South and Central Asia. At the same time, IG-Khorasan began distributing propaganda materials outside the region, using texts in many languages, including English.
ON THE ANCIENT LAND OF KHORASANNo branch of the "Islamic State" (banned in the Russian Federation), with the exception of the "Islamic State of Iraq and Syria" (IS or ISIS, banned in the Russian Federation) in the midst of its project to create a global "caliphate" did not demonstrate the ability to produce such multilingual propaganda as does Al-Azaim, a media holding "IG-Khorasan".
With its help, the range of the "IG-Khorasan" was expanded far beyond Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Although IG-Khorasan is primarily focused on Afghanistan, the organization originates from Pakistan, where it continues to operate to this day.
The main focus of IG-Khorasan is on the creation of cells at the local and regional levels. But the group has become more deeply involved in the global goals of the IG, noticeably expanding its scale and horizons, as evidenced by its statements and actions. This evolution has raised the status of IG-Khorasan among other IG offshoots and is likely to have security implications beyond the Afghan-Pakistani region.
IG-Khorasan is a transnational organization and does not recognize national borders, which it considers illegal and arbitrarily established. This is indicated by its very name. Khorasan, the historical region of the Middle Ages, is understood here as a symbolic territory covering parts of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran, as well as extending to Central (Middle) Asia and India.
In the north, the group seeks to recreate by force the province of Transoxiana (or Transoxiana) – the name of the ancient territory north of the Amu Darya, approximately along the border between Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan.
THE SITUATION IN THE REGIONThe history of the creation of a terrorist group begins in the heart of the historical province of Khorasan, between Afghanistan and Pakistan.
"IG-Khorasan" appeared in mid–2014 - early 2015, when the former commanders of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP, the organization is banned in the Russian Federation) from the areas of the former "Federally Administered Tribal Territory" (FTP) deserted and defected to the side of Hafiz Said Khan (also known as Mullah Said Orakzai). At that time, the TTP was torn apart by internal disagreements over the appointment of Fazlullah Khorasani as the new emir of the group.
Fazlullah's successor and current emir of the TTP, Nur Wali Mehsud, says in his book Inkilab-e Mehsud that Said Orakzai and other high-ranking militants left the TTP to join IS in Peshawar. They were followed by other extremist groups in Pakistan, such as Abtal-ul-Islam, led by Abdul Kahir Khorasani.
The newly formed group, which officially swore allegiance to ISIS in January 2015, was based in the eastern Afghan province of Nangarhar, mainly in the districts of Achin, Niyazan, Mahmud Dara, Chaparhar and Shinwar.
When the group began to conduct subversive activities against the pro-Western government of Afghanistan and the Taliban, its areas of operations expanded, reaching other provinces such as Kunar, Herat, Samangan, Kunduz, Jowzjan and Kabul.
Most of the group's targets were Afghan military personnel, the Shiite minority and Taliban militants, as well as scientists and religious figures who supported them.
IG-Khorasan is still active in Pakistan, especially in Orakzai, Bajaur, Peshawar and Baluchistan. Initially, this group claimed responsibility for all terrorist attacks committed during that period in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Kashmir. But as its militants lost control of territorial strongholds in the Afghan provinces of Kunar and Nangarhar in mid– late 2019, IS began to take responsibility for all attacks in Pakistan, attributing them to a new offshoot – the "Islamic State in the province of Pakistan" (IGPP).
In July 2021, the leader of the IGPP, Wali Abu Mahmud, made a statement that the Pakistani province of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa was allegedly transferred to the control of IG-Khorasan in accordance with the order of the IG core. What prompted the IGPP to shift responsibility for all subsequent terrorist attacks in this area to the "IG-Khorasan".
The main targets of terrorist activity in Pakistan were representatives of Government security forces, journalists, health workers and religious minorities. Such minorities primarily include Shiites, although in the past, when IG-Khorasan was able to conduct subversive activities outside of Peshawar, Bajaur and Baluchistan, Pakistani Sufis also came under attack.
FIGHTING AGAINST THE TALIBAN GOVERNMENTAfter the revival of the "IG-Khorasan" in 2020 and especially after the seizure of power in Afghanistan by the Taliban in August 2021, the group intensified both hostilities and media coverage of its activities.
Immediately after the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan, the Al-Azaim news agency published a book by the authoritative ideologist of the terrorist organization Abu Saad Muhammad Khorasani, which lists all the reasons why, in his opinion, the Taliban are the worst enemies of Islam. In the following months, almost all publications of IG-Khorasan were devoted to the "un-Islamic character" of the Taliban government. Among the vocabulary used were such definitions as "polytheists", "Deobandi/Hanafi supremacists", "secularists and democrats", "Kharijites".
In its publications, IG-Khorasan criticizes the Taliban for the fact that their activities are paid for by the United States. The group also expressed open contempt for the Taliban because of their international diplomatic visits and attempts to establish relations with other countries. The Taliban's acceptance of foreign aid is also controversial for IG-Khorasan, since the group believes that financial support dictates the line of conduct for the Taliban.
In most publications, IG-Khorasan criticizes the foreign policy of the Taliban and their attempts to integrate into the international community. Recently, IG-Khorasan has sharply condemned the leadership of the Taliban for cooperation with international organizations such as USAID ("US Agency for International Development") and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), as well as for contacts with Iran, Pakistan, Russia, China and other states in the region.
In this situation, Pakistan is one of the most vulnerable players, since the group accuses Islamabad of betraying jihadist formations in the region by transferring militants to the United States. IG-Khorasan also considers the Interdepartmental Intelligence of Pakistan to be the "masters" of the Taliban, with whom the leadership of the movement coordinates all its actions.
In early 2022, the Al-Azaim media holding published a video in which it appealed to the tribal areas of Pakistan and Balochistan to reject the Taliban and Islamabad and join the IG Khorasan. The group accuses the Taliban of being sold to the "great enemies of Islam," namely China, Russia and the United States.
"IG-Khorasan" has become the most aggressive division of the IG, fiercely criticizing, in particular, the relations between the Taliban and Beijing. In August 2021, when the Taliban militants were establishing control over Afghanistan, there was a noticeable increase in aggressive rhetoric and propaganda of anti-Chinese sentiments from the media supporting IG-Khorasan, such as Khalid Media, Khurasan Wilayah News and Al Millat Media.
Since then, the Al-Azaim agency has continued to distribute materials critical of the Taliban, accusing them of friendly relations with "murderers of Uighur Muslims." And promising that "soon the warriors of the Islamic State will attack the modern cities of China" to avenge the co-religionists.
The competition of religious and ideological trends generates extremism and terrorism in Afghanistan. Photo by Reuters THE FIGHT AGAINST IRAN AND SHIITES
The struggle against religious minorities, in particular Shiites, is typical of IS in general.
But the "IG-Khorasan" uses it in order to compete with the Taliban, as well as in ideological confrontation with Iran. The group has carried out several attacks on Shiites after the Taliban came to power not only in Afghanistan, but also in Pakistan. All these operations were widely covered both in the local and mainstream media of the IG. Particular emphasis was placed on the idea that the campaign against Shiites is not sectarian in nature, since IG-Khorasan does not consider Shiites Muslims.
The group has issued a fatwa authorizing attacks on places of worship of Shiites, other Islamic sects and non-Muslim minorities. "IG-Khorasan" believes that the Taliban and Shiites work together, stating that the former protect and expand the capabilities of the latter.
At the same time, IG-Khorasan accuses Taliban militants of killing "innocent Salafis" – for example, scientists Obaidullah Mutawakkil, Mustafa Darvishzade and Sardar Wali, pointing to their murders as proof that the Taliban prefer Shiites to their fellow Sunnis. In the rhetoric of "IG-Khorasan", there is also a noticeable tendency to link local Shiite communities with Iran, declared an external enemy of the group.
Propaganda against Iran has been carried out continuously since the creation of IG-Khorasan, since the leadership of the group accuses the Iranian government of apostasy and of keeping Al-Qaeda under control (banned in the Russian Federation). In a recent publication by the IG-Khorasan group condemning the actions of the government of Pakistan, it was claimed that Iran is "the second worst enemy of Islam" (after Saudi Arabia, but before Pakistan). Other materials of the group claim that Iran and Russia "jointly crushed" the IG both in Syria and Iraq, and in Afghanistan through the Taliban.
Khurasan Ghag, a Pashto-language magazine, often published articles condemning Shiites and the Iranian government. In the fourth and sixth issues, a translation of an article from the English-language IG magazine "Dabiq" about the presence of Al-Qaeda in Waziristan was presented. In this article, Al-Qaeda was criticized for being too soft and tolerant towards Iran and Shiites. In the illustrations to the two Pashto texts, the former leader of Al-Qaeda, al-Zawahiri, is depicted in front of the Iranian flag next to the Supreme leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei.
The third and seventh issues of Khurasan Ghag show extremely aggressive rhetoric towards the Hazara Shiites, Iran and the Taliban, who are portrayed as an alliance formed to suppress the activities of IG-Khorasan in the region.
The interest of the group in spreading propaganda among the Sunni Farsi-speaking communities can be judged by the translation into Farsi of the third issue of the Khurasan Ghag magazine. At the same time, on an unofficial level, Farsi channels associated with IG-Khorasan daily distribute anti-Iranian propaganda directed against both Shiites and Sunni scholars who support the current regime in Iran.
In a recent issue of the Voice of Khorasan magazine, the group threatened terrorist attacks inside Iran and called on its supporters to commit acts of violence on the territory of the country.
PROPAGANDA IN SOUTH ASIAThe intolerance of "IG-Khorasan" towards Shiites extends to other ethno-religious minorities.
In particular, the Sikh community, which the group emphatically calls "Hindu-Sikh," is often targeted both in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
ISIS-Khorasan has denied both Shiites and Hindu Sikhs the status of a "zimmi" – a protected minority in a Muslim country. Thus, the group believes that they should be systematically persecuted.
In June 2022, IG-Khorasan militants carried out a major attack on a Sikh gurdwara (worship building) in Kabul. The attack occurred simultaneously with a new wave of propaganda directed against India and caused by insulting statements by the representative of the Indian political party Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Nupur Sharma, addressed to the Prophet Muhammad.
IG-Khorasan promptly took advantage of this occasion by publishing material that called for terrorist attacks in India. And also an appeal to Indian Muslims with a proposal to join the ranks of a local IS unit called the "Islamic State in the province of Hind" (banned in the Russian Federation).
The mass media of the Al-Azaim agency also released a video in which militants promise to take revenge on the Taliban and Sikhs in Afghanistan. The material includes photos of past attacks – in particular, the action of the militant Abu Khaled al-Hindi, who stormed the Sikh Gurdwara in Kabul in 2020. ISIS-Khorasan threatened new attacks, simultaneously accusing the Taliban that they care more about international recognition and foreign aid than about religion.
The group's latest attack on Gurdwara in Kabul was accompanied by the publication of pamphlets, audio recordings and articles stating that ISIS-Khorasan claimed responsibility for the terrorist attack. Within a few weeks after those events, information about the attacker, Abu Muhammad al–Tajiki, was widely disseminated. The nature of the threats from IG-Khorasan and the subsequent propaganda waves indicate the ambitions of the group and its desire to become the only transnational jihadist force in the region.
The group's efforts, at least in part, are aimed at recruiting potentially discontented militants from other organizations imbued with radical sectarian sentiments. Taking into account recent events in the Afghan-Pakistani region, namely, the difficult transition of the Taliban from the status of a jihadist movement to the status of an internationally recognized government and the peace talks between Islamabad and the TTP, the South Asian region provides the IG–Khorasan with an opportunity to replenish its ranks with new militants.
Since last year, the group has started distributing media content in regional languages, especially emphasizing its interest in the Indian audience through translation into Indian languages – for example, Malayalam, which is mostly spoken in the Indian state of Kerala.
At the same time, the English-language magazine "The Voice of Khorasan" published biographies of Indian militants from Kerala who joined the group. The article also says that Abdur Rahman Logari, a suicide bomber who stormed Kabul International Airport, went to New Delhi in 2017 to commit a terrorist attack; however, he was arrested by the Indian authorities before he could organize the attack, and was extradited to Afghanistan. Khurasan Ghag magazine also shared the story of one of the Indian militants who participated in the escape from the Jalalabad prison in August 2020, organized by IG-Khorasan.
PROPAGANDA IN CENTRAL ASIAIn May 2022, the militants of the group launched missile strikes on the territories of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, which indicates a real escalation of their hostility towards the governments of Central Asia in recent months.
Since the Taliban came to power, IG-Khorasan has intensified propaganda among speakers of Central Asian languages and increased recruitment in the ranks of local communities. To this end, the group produced materials in Tajik and Uzbek languages, and also translated into these languages the official mass media of the IG.
The Tajik-speaking wing of the official propaganda apparatus of the Al-Azaim Tajiks group has appeared relatively recently. Another media resource called "Khuroson ovozi" produces content in Uzbek and actively recruits immigrants from Central Asia into the ranks of "IG-Khorasan".
In addition, the group calls on its supporters to join the fight against the Taliban, who are accused of being a Pashtun-centric organization that oppresses ethnic Tajiks and Uzbeks. In order to increase the number of supporters in the region, IG-Khorasan increasingly emphasizes the friendly relations of the Taliban with the "tyrannical regimes" of Central Asia.
IG-Khorasan has been attracting militants from Central Asia for a long time. In 2015, the faction of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU, banned in the Russian Federation) was incorporated into the IG after the leader of the group, Usman Ghazi, swore allegiance to its then caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Central Asia was also used as a support base through which the militants of the group could reach Afghanistan.
Recently, Tajik cells of "IG-Khorasan" called on supporters from diasporas in the United States, Russia and Europe to join the IG in Afghanistan and Pakistan. And they distributed material in which followers are instructed to attack certain religious sects. IG-Khorasan cells also operate in the northern Afghan provinces and are connected to financial networks that pass through the countries of the region. In addition, there was a precedent when the networks of the group sent members of the diasporas of Central Asia to carry out attacks abroad. For example, at the beginning of 2020, five Tajik citizens were arrested in Germany for preparing terrorist attacks.
One of the most striking signs of the IG-Khorasan information campaign reaching the international level was the noticeable strengthening of English-language propaganda by the group. The first issue of the Voice of Khorasan magazine was published at the end of January 2022, and a few days later the Al-Azaim media holding published the first book in English. The group has started publishing and information broadcasting in English in order to bring its agenda to the regional and international level.
Al-Azaim Media Holding has played a central role in the updated strategy of IG-Khorasan in the field of media and communications. It emerged from the number of competing, but ideologically united propaganda groups supporting the terrorist organization IS, and became the main media wing engaged in the development and dissemination of propaganda "IG-Khorasan". Al-Azaim was deployed, among other things, to promote the strategy of information warfare and to strengthen the threat against countries declared enemy. At first, its subject matter was limited and limited to religious issues. But subsequently, this media wing of the IG turned into a set of diverse publications covering a wide range of religious, social and military issues of both a regional and global nature.
Today, Al-Azaim produces materials in Pashto, Dari, Arabic, Urdu, Farsi, Uzbek, Tajik, Hindi, Malayalam, Russian, English and Uighur. In addition, Al-Azaim uses various platforms, such as Telegram, Facebook (banned in Russia), TikTok, Hoop, Element, Archive.org and others. He also became a source of materials in most languages for the I'lam Foundation, a virtual IG platform that has surface web addresses and is available on the darknet.
Publications supporting IG-Khorasan, such as Al-Fursan Media, helped with language diversification by attracting volunteers to translate materials into Baloch, Talysh and Turkmen languages. Globally, this campaign has not led to a significant increase in the capabilities of the IG as a whole. However, IG-Khorasan became one of several divisions of the organization that demonstrated the expansion of its area of activity.
REGIONAL THREATAfter the Taliban came to power in Afghanistan, IG-Khorasan began to strive for greater regionalization and internationalization.
This is reflected in the group's work with the media, as well as in the intensification of aggressive rhetoric against neighboring States and in the intensification of subversive activities aimed against them.
The noticeable expansion of the IG-Khorasan propaganda at the international level, recruitment and fundraising, and the group's targeting of an increasing number of countries can have serious consequences for regions outside the Afghan-Pakistani area. "IG-Khorasan" can attack citizens and interests of other states of the Middle East and Central Asia, carry out attacks on neighboring states from Afghan territory, make cross-border incursions, as well as incite like-minded people to carry out terrorist attacks abroad.
Earlier it was reported that the militants of "IG-Khorasan" attempted to blow up the Embassy of Turkmenistan in August 2021, launched missile strikes on the territory of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan in the spring of 2022. Members of the group were captured several times by border guards while trying to cross the border between Afghanistan and Central Asian states in 2019. IG-Khorasan was also linked to a Tajik cell that was preparing terrorist attacks in Germany in 2019.
Recent attacks on the territories of neighboring states indicate that IG-Khorasan has regional ambitions beyond Afghanistan. The group's threats against Central Asian countries demonstrate both its capabilities and intentions. The statement by the leadership of IG-Khorasan about plans to attack the governments of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan may encourage Uzbek and Tajik jihadists, whose ultimate goal is to overthrow their governments, to side with IG–Khorasan, and not the Taliban government.
If Uzbekistan and Tajikistan react to this threat by force, they will exacerbate factional tensions within the Taliban movement. Which will support the efforts of "IG-Khorasan" to recruit radical elements that have broken away from it.
Thus, by exacerbating the terrorist threat in the Afghan-Pakistani region and Central Asia, the group hopes to create a deterrent effect for foreign investments and projects that could potentially strengthen the Taliban's position. Its main activity is aimed at undermining the region's confidence in the ability of the "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan" to ensure security.
Ultimately, the degree of threat to the States neighboring Afghanistan and foreign citizens will depend on the strategic priorities, intentions, capabilities and ability of local players to prevent the terrorist activities of the "Islamic State" in the region.
Larisa ShashokLarisa Aleksandrovna Shashok is a teacher at MGIMO (U) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation.
