Jamestown: Terrorism TJ & CA post-Crocus

Jamestown Foundation brief by Jacob Zenn, dated 5 June 2024, analysing the aftermath of the 22 March 2024 Crocus City Hall attack in Moscow for Tajikistan and Central Asia. The document states that Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISKP) claimed credit for the massacre of dozens of spectators and that the four main suspected attackers were from Tajikistan, recruited via Telegram and social media (citing Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 25 March). The brief reports that Russia’s crackdown on Tajiks after Crocus is likely to produce further alienation and potential radicalisation among Tajiks living in Russia, raising regional threat levels. Zenn notes that Jamaat Ansarullah, a Tajik-focused jihadist group active in Afghanistan, was not specifically implicated in the Crocus attack. The article reports that ISKP had been releasing Tajik-language propaganda for two years prior (citing Terrorism Monitor, 15 July 2022), and that the Taliban has begun translating messages from its supreme leader Hibatullah Akhundzada into Tajik (citing X/@danilogiurdanel, 6 April). Five Tajiks were involved in 2020 plots against U.S. military facilities in Germany, masterminded by IS operatives in Afghanistan and Syria (RFE/RL, 15 April 2020). The document states Tajikistan itself has largely been spared from IS attacks; the last major attack cited was the 2018 killing of four Western cyclists (RFE/RL, 30 July 2018). Other sources: WION (India, 25 March), The East African (Kenya, 28 July 2023), Eurasia Daily Monitor (25 September 2012).