Russia is investigating one thousand cases of citizens supporting terrorist groups in Syria and Iraq
More than a thousand cases on Russian involvement in terrorist groups in Syria and Iraq are being investigated in Russia, as reported by Prosecutor Yury Chaika.
“Access to thousands of resources on the Internet has been limited at the request of the Prosecutor General’s office; unlawful information has been removed from nearly seven thousand websites. More than a thousand cases are being investigated for involvement of our citizens in terrorist groups on the territory of Iraq and Syria,” he said during a speech.
Earlier, in March, an Independent Expert Organization, “The International Crisis Group”, issued a report entitled “Jihad for export? North Caucasian underground” stating that Russian authorities contributed to the outflow of extremists from the southern regions of the country to ensure security during the Olympics in Sochi in 2014.
The report also contained statements from a source of the security forces in Dagestan who said that “the borders were open” for terrorists and the security forces “to get out of there”.
At the end of December 2015, a member of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, Valery Rashkin, received a reply to the request of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs stating that the law-enforcement authorities, together with FSB, are monitoring more than 2,800 Russians who left the country to participate in hostilities in Syria and Iraq. Nearly 900 criminal cases have been initiated against the Russian Islamists.