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ISIS

New Norwegians take top roles in Isis jihadi group

Several Norwegian citizens have risen to leadership positions in Isis, the militant group battling to establish a caliphate in Iraq and Syria, according to the latest information gathered by Norwegian military intelligence.

New Norwegians take top roles in Isis jihadi group
Norwegian Chilean Isis fighter Bastian Vasquez in 2014. Photo: Screen Grab/Facebook
“We believe that some of the Norwegians in Isil [Isis] have risen to middle-management functions,” Lieutenant General Kjell Grandhagen, head of the Norwegian Intelligence Service, told Dagbladet newspaper  in an interview published on Thursday. 
 
The most prominent Norwegian Isis commander, Bastian Vasquez, a Norwegian Chilean from Bærum, outside Oslo, was reportedly killed in the autumn. But Grandhagen said several others had also been given senior ranks in the organisation. 
 
“There are still several Norwegians who hold leadership positions in Isil,” Grandhagen told the paper. Among then is a Norwegian Eritrean from Skien, who was also last summer reported to have become an Isis commander.  
 
Many Norwegians fighting for Isis were first radicalised by the Profetens Ummah group, which is centred around Østfold, Vestfold and Telemark, near Oslo. 
 
According to Grandhagen, Isis has been shaken by the recent loss of the border town of Kobani, where they were defeated by Kurdish Peshmerga forces. However, he didn't think that such reversals yet signalled the beginning of the end for the organisation. 
 
“We see an Isis… which is impaired in some areas and must change its tactical concept to adapt to the situation,” Grandhagen said. “But we have no faith in those who think that this is an organisation that will let itself be defeated militarily in the near future. They have all the qualities needed to stand militarily for a long time, both in the areas where they reside and as a base for international terrorism.” 
 
The Norwegian Intelligence Service estimates that there are now 150 Norwegians fighting in Syria and Iraq. 

ISIS

Ex-jihadi housewife jailed in Norway for joining IS

A Norwegian court on Tuesday sentenced a woman who lived as a housewife in Syria to prison for being a member of the Islamic State group (IS), despite not actively fighting herself.

Ex-jihadi housewife jailed in Norway for joining IS
The Kurdish-run al-Hol camp which holds suspected relatives of Islamic State fighters.Photo: Delil SOULEIMAN / AFP

The Oslo court sentenced the Norwegian-Pakistani woman to three and a half years in prison for “participating in a terrorist organisation” by taking care of her household and enabling her three husbands to fight.

“By travelling to an area controlled by IS in Syria… by moving in and living with her husbands, taking care of the children and various tasks at home, the defendant enabled her three husbands to actively participate in IS fighting,” judge Ingmar Nilsen said as he read out the verdict.

Being a housewife to three successive husbands did not render her a passive bystander, the judge said.

“On the contrary, she was a supporter who enabled the jihad, looked after her three husbands at home and raised the new generation of IS recruits,” he said.

The young woman, who admitted having “radical ideas” at the time, left for Syria in early 2013 to join an Islamist fighter, Bastian Vasquez, who was fighting the regime.

Although she did not take up arms herself, she was accused of having allowed her husbands to go fight while taking care of her two children and household chores.

The trial was the first prosecution in Norway of someone who had returned after joining IS.

“This is a special case,” prosecutor Geir Evanger acknowledged during the trial.

“This is the first time that, to put it bluntly, someone has been charged for being a wife and mother.”

The prosecution had called for a four-year sentence, while the defence had called for her acquittal and immediately appealed Tuesday’s verdict.

The woman’s lawyer, Nils Christian Nordhus, argued that his client had quickly wanted to leave Syria after being subjected to domestic violence.

She had also been a victim of human trafficking because she had been held against her will, he added.

But the judge stressed that she had participated in the organisation “knowingly” and of her own will.

The woman was repatriated to Norway in early 2020 on humanitarian grounds with her two children, including a young boy described as seriously ill.

At least four other Norwegian women and their children are being held in Kurdish-controlled camps in Syria.

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