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Chechen on trial for funding jihadist group

The trial of a suspected Islamist has begun in Vienna - under heightened security. The 37-year-old man from Russia's Chechnya region is accused of working with and funding the al-Qaeda linked Caucasus Emirate jihadist group in south-western Russia, to the tune of €530,000.

Published: 21 October 2015 10:43 CEST

Chechen on trial for funding jihadist group

The man has been held in Vienna's Josefstadt prison.

The group wants to establish an independent Islamic emirate in the North Caucasus region, and has committed numerous terror attacks against civilians, including the Moscow metro bombing of 2010 that killed dozens.

The defendant is believed to have raised funds for the Caucasus Emirate throughout Europe, sending money to the militants via couriers.

Some of the money was hidden in the Vienna apartment of a 28-year-old Chechen, who is also being tried as an accomplice.

The 37-year-old – who has two prosthetic arms – has been held in pretrial detention in Vienna’s Josefstadt prison. Reports suggest he may have lost his forearms trying to carry out a terror attack, although this has not been confirmed.

The hearing is scheduled to last two days. Both men face up to ten years in jail if found guilty.

Around 30,000 Chechen refugees live in Austria. The majority arrived around a decade ago, fleeing Russia’s wars with Chechnya and human rights abuses.

They have become prime targets for Isis recruiters and around 100 young Chechens have left Austria to fight for Isis in Syria.

What is the risk of new terror attacks in Austria?

With responsibility for the Moscow attack being taken by the Islamist terror organisation ISIS-K, national intelligence services are reevaluating the threat posed to targets within their borders.

‘No concrete threat’

Austrian officials have been quick to give their appraisal of the situation.

“We currently have the Islamist scene under control,” stressed Omar Haijawi-Pirchner, head of the Directorate of State Security & Intelligence (DSN) – the governmental agency responsible for combatting internal threats – in an interview with the Ö1 Morgenjournal radio programme on Tuesday.

He continued: “The terrorist attacks in Moscow, for example, definitely increase the risk. But at the moment, we do not see any concrete threat of an attack in Austria,”

Other experts and officials have warned that while there are no concrete threats, Austrians should not be complacent.

‘Situation is still valid’

Interior Minister Gerhard Karner announced tighter security at church festivals during the Easter period, in the days after the attack, and stressed that the high terror alert level introduced after the October 7 Hamas attacks was still in place.

“This increased risk situation is still valid,” noted Karner.

READ MORE: What does Austria’s raised terror alert mean for the public?

Meanwhile, terror researcher Peter Neumann of King’s College London told ORF’s ‘ZiB 2’ news broadcast on Monday that Austria remains a potential target due to its Central Asian migrant population.

Neumann noted that countries at most risk are those “in which Tajik and Central Asian diasporas exist and where ISIS-K finds it relatively easy to identify and recruit people”.

He continued, identifying both Austria and Germany as “countries in which the ISPK is particularly active and which are particularly at risk from terrorist attacks”.

New threats

Austria has not been spared from attacks from homegrown terrorists.

On November 2nd 2020, amid Coronavirus lockdowns, Austrian-born Kujtim Fejzulai shot and killed four, injuring twenty-three others during a shooting spree across Vienna. He was ultimately shot dead by police.

Fejzulai was already under surveillance by federal authorities for his beliefs and had been released from prison on parole less than a year before.

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