French schools pay tribute to teacher beheaded by radical Islamist

October 15, 2021 Article

French schools have paid tribute to a teacher beheaded by a radical Islamist last year after he showed caricatures of the prophet of Islam to his class.

Samuel Paty, a history and geography teacher, was murdered on October 16 near his school in a north-west Paris suburb by an 18-year-old of Chechen origin who had become radicalised. The attacker was later shot dead by police.

The two-day national homage includes a minute’s silence held in schools on Friday, with teachers to organise a discussion in classes on the memory of Mr Paty.

“We must not succumb to fear,” Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer said in a speech at a Paris high school, adding the French republic will not abandon its “values of freedom and democracy”.

“Samuel Paty was doing what was expected from a teacher: transmit knowledge.” He “wanted to teach his students to think by themselves … We will never forget him”, Mr Blanquer said. Some classrooms and schools will be named after the teacher.

Earlier on Friday, the rector of the Paris Grand Mosque and about 20 imams laid a wreath in homage to Mr Paty outside his school in Conflans-Saint-Honorine, with a banner reading: “Ignorance leads to fear, fear leads to hatred, hatred leads to violence.”

Chems-Eddine Hafiz, rector of the Paris Grand Mosque, said: “We are sad and angry at the same time. Sad because a man has been killed, survived by an orphan … No matter the reasons, one can’t kill a man in the name of Islam. It’s impossible, it’s the very antithesis of what Islam is about in all the Koran verses.”

A ceremony will take place on Saturday at the Ministry of Education, where a plaque honouring Mr Paty will be unveiled.

His family will also meet President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Jean Castex, and a gathering will be organised near the teacher’s school.

The killing led French authorities to reaffirm France’s cherished rights of expression and secularism.

Mr Paty’s name was disclosed on social media after a class debate on free expression during which he showed caricatures published by the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, which triggered a newsroom massacre by extremists in January 2015.

Authorities have identified Mr Paty’s killer as Abdoullakh Anzorov, a Moscow-born Chechen refugee. Anzorov claimed responsibility in a text accompanied by a photograph of the victim found on his phone.

Sixteen people have since been charged in the case, most of them for “complicity in a terrorist murder” or “criminal association”.

They include five students of Mr Paty’s school, all minors, accused of having helped the killer in exchange for promises of payments of 300-350 euros.

The investigation established that the attacker knew the name of the teacher and the address of his school but he did not have the means to identify him.

The suspects also include a student’s father who posted videos on social media that called for mobilisation against the teacher. His daughter has been charged with defamation.

An Islamist activist who helped the man disseminate the virulent messages naming Mr Paty has also been charged in the case.

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Categories: Chems-Eddine Hafiz, Muhammad, News, Prophet of Islam, Radical Islamist, Samuel Paty

Terrorist will not answer questions if forced to attend, Arena bomb inquiry told

October 14, 2021 Article

A convicted terrorist accused of grooming Manchester Arena bomber Salman Abedi will not answer any questions if he is forced to attend the public inquiry into the atrocity, a court has heard.

The bereaved families of the 22 people killed in the explosion want Abdalraouf Abdallah, 28, to explain his links to Abedi and explore how the suicide attacker became radicalised.

The inquiry’s legal team served a notice on him this summer to attend the hearing in Manchester next Wednesday, but Abdallah’s lawyers argue that would infringe his human rights and violate his privilege against self-incrimination.

On Thursday, counsel to the inquiry Paul Greaney QC said: “Mr Abdallah has evidence of a high degree of potential relevance to give in relation to issues in relation to the radicalisation of Salman Abedi, and the planning and preparation for the Arena attack.

“As is publicly known, he is currently serving a sentence for terrorism offences and he was in contact with Salman Abedi both in person and electronically from 2014.

“Moreover he is regarded by the inquiry’s instructed expert on radicalisation, Dr Matthew Wilkinson, as responsible for, as he puts it, grooming Salman Abedi into the violent Islamist extremist worldview.”

In July 2016 Abdallah, from Moss Side, Manchester, was given a extended sentence of nine and half years, with a custodial term of five and a half years, after he was convicted of preparing and funding acts of terrorism by helping four others travel to Syria.

Abedi, 22, twice visited Abdallah in prison and was in contact via a mobile phone smuggled into jail in the months leading up to the Arena bombing on May 22 2017.

The inquiry has heard Abdallah was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder after he became a paraplegic when injured in fighting in Libya in 2011 during the country’s uprising.

His barrister, Rajiv Menon QC, said that up to May 2020, when his client was first contacted by the inquiry, his medical records showed three incidents of self-harm in prison, but since then it had “markedly increased”, with 12 more self-harm incidents recorded, including, he said, an attempted suicide.

He submitted: “We say the evidence is clear, there is a real and objectively well-founded risk that Abdalrouf Abdallah will seriously and imminently self harm again if compelled to give evidence to the inquiry.”

Consultant forensic psychiatrist Dr John Kent, instructed by the inquiry to interview Abdallah last month, said his motivation for self-harm was varied and some had been linked to frustrations with the prison regime, including vaping on one occasion.

The doctor told Mr Greaney it was “very difficult” to assess whether the recent incidents could be manipulation by Abdallah, designed to avoid giving evidence.

A psychiatrist instructed by Abdallah’s legal team has said he is unfit to give evidence and making him do so could risk self-harm and suicide.

Addressing the issue of self-incrimination, Mr Menon said: “Forcing him to attend either in person or via CVP (videolink) and subjecting him to hours of questions that he will not be answering is, with all due respect, a pointless exercise and will serve no purpose other than to dehumanise and humiliate an already vulnerable man and frustrate all those who want him to answer questions.

“If there is a real and an appreciable risk that an answer that Mr Abdallah were to give may be used against him in criminal proceedings, he is entitled to refuse to answer that question.”

He said that counter-terrorism police had previously interviewed his client under caution as a suspect in the Arena attack and the following year, last summer, he was asked “similar if not identical questions” in prison by inquiry officials.

Mr Menon said: “In those circumstances he felt, and we say justifiably so, that he was being treated as a suspect both by the police and the inquiry.”

He said Dr Wilkinson’s expert report which concluded Abdallah groomed Abedi and was “effectively a co-conspirator” in the Arena attack was a “preposterous suggestion speculated at best without any proper evidential foundation”.

The inquiry also heard Abdallah told Dr Kent in one of his two interviews that he did intend to give evidence at his forthcoming parole board hearing, although Mr Menon said no date had been set for it yet and he had not given any legal advice to him over the matter.

Abdallah, who denies grooming Abedi or any involvement in the Arena attack, was released from jail in November on licence before being recalled in January – reportedly over a breach of a general condition requiring good behaviour.

Inquiry chairman Sir John Saunders said he will make a ruling “as soon as possible” on whether Abdallah should be compelled to attend next week, either in person or by prison videolink.

The inquiry was adjourned until next Tuesday.

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Categories: Abdalraouf Abdallah, Manchester Arena Inquiry, Manchester Bombing, News, Salman Abedi

German city allows mosques to broadcast call to Friday prayers

October 11, 2021 Article

The German city of Cologne will start permitting mosques to broadcast muezzin calls for prayer, the city said.

The calls can be broadcast for five minutes every week for the Friday prayer around noon and audible outside the Muslim houses of prayer, city spokeswoman Katja Reuter said.

Cologne mosques need to apply for a special permit in order to be able to broadcast the call.

The initiative will be limited to two years and then be re-evaluated.

The city’s mayor welcomed the decision, saying that “if in addition to the sounds of the church bells we also hear the call of the muezzin, it shows that in Cologne diversity is valued and lived”.

“Permitting the call of the muezzin is a sign of respect,” Mayor Henriette Reker tweeted last week.

Christian church bells ring out daily in many German cities and towns.

Cologne, a western city of one million, has one of Germany’s biggest Muslim communities and about 35 mosques.

Most Muslims initially came from Turkey as guest workers 60 years ago and then later brought their families.

Only few other Muslim houses of prayer across Germany, like in the western towns of Oer-Erkenschwick and Dueren, have been broadcasting the muezzin’s call for years, sometimes despite the protests of Christian neighbours.

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Categories: call to prayer, Cologne, News, Turkish Muslims

Scores killed and wounded by Afghan mosque blast during Friday prayers

October 8, 2021 Article

At least 100 people have been killed or wounded in an explosion targeting Shiite Muslims at a mosque in northern Afghanistan, according to a Taliban police official.

Dost Mohammad Obaida said the “majority of them have been killed”.

The blast occurred during the Friday prayer service at the Gozar-e-Sayed Abad Mosque in Kunduz province, when members of the Shiite minority typically go in large numbers for worship.

If confirmed, the death toll would be the highest in an attack by militants since US and Nato troops left Afghanistan at the end of August and the Taliban took control.

Witness Ali Reza said he was praying at the time of the explosion and reported seeing many casualties.

Taliban chief spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said Taliban special forces had arrived at the scene and were investigating the incident.

The cause of the blast was not immediately clear. No group has claimed responsibility.

The Taliban leadership has been grappling with a growing threat from the local affiliate of the so-called Islamic State group, known as the Islamic State in Khorasan.

IS militants have ramped up attacks to target their rivals, including two deadly bombings in Kabul.

IS has also targeted Afghanistan’s religious minorities in attacks.

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Categories: Afghan mosque blast, Afghanistan, Gozar-e-Sayed Abad, News, Shi'ite

Eddie Marsan: ‘Young people need to know what antisemitism is’

September 29, 2021 Article

Ridley Road starts on BBC One on Sunday, October 3.

It’s the Swinging Sixties in London’s East End, and far-right fascism is on the rise.

Enter Vivien Epstein, a young Jewish hairdresser from Manchester who finds herself embroiled in an undercover movement against racism, after following her lover, Jack Morris, to the capital.

This sets the scene for a new four-part BBC thriller called Ridley Road, written by Sarah Solemani and based on the book of the same name by British author Jo Bloom.

It’s a vivid, romantic, and inspiring series, which is rising star Aggi O’Casey’s first television role (she plays Vivien) and also stars Rory Kinnear, Eddie Marsan, Tracy-Ann Oberman, Tamzin Outhwaite, and Tom Varey.

What makes it more poignant is how it’s inspired by real events; Jack (played by Varey) is a member of the 62 Group – a coalition of Jewish men who formed in 1962, largely in response to the National Socialist Movement, which was created by Colin Jordan (played by Kinnear in Ridley Road).

Here, O’Casey, Marsan, and Oberman tell us more about the characters and timely themes explored in the drama.

EMPOWERING WOMEN

Ridley Road was O’Casey’s first audition after graduating from The Lir Academy in Dublin, and she admits she found the script “really encouraging”.

It also feels relevant, because we are living in times when we are seeing the rise of fascism again. “It’s just as alive, just rebranded – and just as ignored,” suggests O’Casey.

“We see Vivien make decisions about how to take control and look after her community and the ones she loves,” she says.

“It’s a really important story for now because people feel really disempowered and they’re not sure how to go about things that they believe in and there’s so much fear. Vivien is scared all the time, but she fights through that.”

HUGE RESPONSIBILITY

Londoner Marsan, 53, plays cab driver Soly, the leader of the 62 Group. Discussing his research ahead of filming, the actor – best known for crime drama Ray Donovan – says he watched documentaries and read books. But he also already had a historical understanding from his childhood.

“I grew up with men like Soly; tough, Jewish, working-class men,” he notes. “It’s a very important story to tell, because of the rise of antisemitism in both the left and the right, and I think young people need to know what antisemitism is.

“It’s very insidious, and I know it’s a strange word, but it’s almost a ‘seductive’ racism. It’s sold as egalitarianism. People can make you feel like you’re trying to create an equal world.”

He adds: “I was brought up in Tower Hamlets which is the most multi-racial borough in the country. I’m not religious in any sense – the only value I can pass on to my children are the values of the celebration of diversity that I was blessed to be raised with. And so, it’s very personal for me to do something like this.”

PERSONAL STORY

Playing Soly’s wife Nancy is 55-year-old Oberman. Having grown up in a Jewish family in Stanmore, North London, the former EastEnders and Friday Night Dinner star could also draw on her own experiences for the part.

She says Nancy reminds her of her great grandmothers and great aunts from the East End “who had come off the immigrant boat with nothing and whose sheer determination, grit, toughness, love of fashion got them through it”.

She recalls: “One of my great grandmothers was called Sarah Portugal; she lived in the East End, she smoked a pipe, but she wore a slash of red lipstick no matter what was going on.

“These women were very fashion-conscious, and I like to think Nancy had a bit of that as well. She worked in a fabric emporium, and she marries a man like Soly; she’s his right-hand woman and I love their relationship, the equality. He’s the brawns, and she’s his hands in the back and the brains.”

TIMELY THEMES

Over the past four years, Oberman has been standing up to what she sees as a “huge rise of antisemitism on social media”.

And she hopes that Ridley Road reminds people of the anti-Jewish hatred in British history, which has “been forgotten in the annals of time”.

“When people talk about Jews as if they’re all rich and controlling, they have to remember that the Jewish socialist background came from the East End, from these working-class boys like Eddie represents, like Nancy represents,” she explains.

These working-class people, she says, came over as immigrants around 1905, fleeing the pogroms. “They came to Britain thinking it was a beacon and a haven of tolerance, but were treated like complete outsiders; ‘no blacks, no Jews, no dogs’ was on the list of all boarding houses and hostels.

“Jews have always been othered. And we have very conveniently forgotten this little piece of history that Ridley Road is going to tell so beautifully, and that fascism is there lurking under the surface, and that the Jews had to look after themselves because the authorities weren’t helping them.

“I’m hoping there won’t be a backlash on Twitter to this because this tells the true story.”

 

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Categories: Antisemitism, Eddie Marsan, Fascism, News, Swinging Sixties, Tracy Ann Oberman

Taliban official speaks of strict punishment and says executions will return

September 24, 2021 Article

One of the founders of the Taliban has said the hard-line movement will once again carry out executions and amputations of hands, though perhaps not in public.

Mullah Nooruddin Turabi dismissed outrage over the Taliban’s executions in the past, which sometimes took place in front of crowds at a stadium, and warned the world against interfering.

Mr Turabi was the chief enforcer of its harsh interpretation of Islamic law when they last ruled Afghanistan

“Everyone criticised us for the punishments in the stadium, but we have never said anything about their laws and their punishments,” he told The Associated Press, speaking in Kabul. “No one will tell us what our laws should be. We will follow Islam and we will make our laws on the Quran.”

Since the Taliban seized control of the country in August, Afghans have been watching to see whether they will recreate their harsh rule of the late 1990s. Mr Turabi’s comments suggest the group’s leaders remain entrenched in a deeply conservative, hard-line worldview, even as they embrace video and mobile phones.

In his early 60s, he was justice minister and head of the so-called Ministry of Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice — effectively, the religious police — during the Taliban’s previous rule.

At that time, the world denounced the Taliban’s punishments, which took place in Kabul’s sports stadium or on the grounds of the Eid Gah mosque.

Executions of convicted murderers were usually by a single shot to the head, carried out by the victim’s family, who had the option of accepting “blood money” and allowing the culprit to live. For convicted thieves, the punishment was amputation of a hand. For those convicted of highway robbery, a hand and a foot were amputated.

Trials and convictions were rarely public and the judiciary was weighted in favour of Islamic clerics. Mr Turabi said that this time, judges — including women — would adjudicate cases, but the same punishments would be revived.

“Cutting off of hands is very necessary for security,” he said.

Taliban fighters have revived a punishment they commonly used in the past — public shaming of men accused of small-time theft.

On at least two occasions in the past week, Kabul men have been packed into the back of a pickup truck, their hands tied, and been paraded around to humiliate them.

In one case, their faces were painted to identify them as thieves. In the other, stale bread was hung from their necks or stuffed in their mouth. It wasn’t clear what their crimes were.

Wearing a white turban and a bushy, unkempt white beard, Mr Turabi limped slightly on his artificial leg. He lost a leg and one eye fighting Soviet troops in the 1980s.

Under the new Taliban government, he is in charge of prisons. He is among a number of Taliban leaders, including members of the all-male interim Cabinet, who are on a United Nations sanctions list.

During the previous Taliban rule, he was one of the group’s most ferocious and uncompromising enforcers. When the Taliban took power in 1996, one of his first acts was to scream at a woman journalist. In this week’s interview with the AP, Turabi spoke to a woman journalist.

“We are changed from the past,” he said.

He said the Taliban would allow television, mobile phones, photos and video “because this is the necessity of the people, and we are serious about it”.

Mr Turabi dismissed criticism over the previous Taliban rule, arguing that it had succeeded in bringing stability. “We had complete safety in every part of the country,” he said of the late 1990s.

Even as Kabul residents express fear over their new Taliban rulers, some acknowledge grudgingly that the capital has already become safer. Before the Taliban takeover, bands of thieves roamed the streets, and crime had driven most people off the streets after dark.

“It’s not a good thing to see these people being shamed in public, but it stops the criminals because when people see it, they think ‘I don’t want that to be me’,” said Amaan, a storeowner in the centre of Kabul. He asked to be identified by just one name.

Another shopkeeper said it was a violation of human rights but that he was also happy he can open his store after dark.

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Categories: Ministry of Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, Mullah Nooruddin Turabi, News, Punishments, Taliban

Female employees for Kabul city government told to stay at home

September 19, 2021 Article

Female employees in the Kabul city government have been told to stay home, with work only allowed for those who cannot be replaced by men, the interim mayor of Afghanistan’s capital said, detailing the latest restrictions on women by the new Taliban rulers.

The decision to prevent most female city workers from returning to their jobs is another sign that the Taliban, who overran Kabul last month, are enforcing their harsh interpretation of Islam despite initial promises by some that they would be tolerant and inclusive.

In their previous rule in the 1990s, the Taliban had barred girls and women from schools, jobs and public life.

In recent days, the new Taliban government issued several decrees rolling back the rights of girls and women.

It told female middle- and high school students that they could not return to school for the time being, while boys in those grades resumed studies this weekend.

Female university students were informed that studies would take place in gender-segregated settings from now on, and that they must abide by a strict Islamic dress code.

Under the US-backed government deposed by the Taliban, university studies had been co-ed, for the most part.

On Friday, the Taliban shut down the Women’s Affairs Ministry, replacing it with a ministry for the “propagation of virtue and the prevention of vice” and tasked with enforcing Islamic law.

On Sunday, just over a dozen women staged a protest outside the ministry, holding up signs calling for the participation of women in public life.

“A society in which women are not active is (sic) dead society,” one sign read.

“Why are they (the Taliban) taking our rights?” said one of the protesters, 30-year-old Basira Tawana.

“We are here for our rights and the rights of our daughters.”

The protest lasted for about 10 minutes.

After a short verbal confrontation with a man, the women got into cars and left, as Taliban in two cars observed from nearby.

Over the past months, Taliban fighters had broken up several women’s protests by force.

Elsewhere in the city, interim Kabul mayor Hamdullah Namony gave his first news conference since being appointed by the Taliban.

He said that before the Taliban takeover last month, just under one-third of close to 3,000 city employees were women, and that they had worked in all departments.

Mr Namony said on Sunday the female employees have been ordered to stay home, pending a further decision.

He said exceptions were made for women who could not be replaced by men, including some in the design and engineering departments and the attendants of public toilets for women.

Mr Namony did not say how many female employees were forced to stay home.

“There are some areas that men can’t do it, we have to ask our female staff to fulfil their duties, there is no alternative for it,” he said.

Mr Namony also said the new government has begun removing security barriers in Kabul, a city that has endured frequent bombing and shooting attacks over the years.

Such barriers, erected near ministries, embassies and private homes of politicians and warlords, had been commonplace in Kabul for years.

The mayor said private citizens would be charged for the work of taking down the barriers.

While he said most barriers had been removed, reporters touring the city noted that barriers outside most government installations and embassies had been left in place.

The Taliban have tried to present themselves as guarantors of security, in hopes that this will win them support from a public still widely suspicious of their intentions.

Under the previous government, a rise in crime had been a major concern for ordinary Afghans.

Perhaps the toughest challenge faced by the new Taliban rulers is the accelerated economic downturn.

Even before the Taliban takeover, Afghanistan was plagued by major problems, including large-scale poverty, drought and heavy reliance on foreign aid for the state budget.

In a sign of growing desperation, street markets have sprung up in Kabul where residents are selling their belongings.

Some of the sellers are Afghans hoping to leave the country, while others are forced to offer their meagre belongings in hopes of getting money for the next meal.

“Our people need help, they need jobs, they need immediate help, they are not selling their household belongings for choice here,” said Kabul resident Zahid Ismail Khan, who was watching the activity in one of the impromptu markets.

“For a short-term people might try to find a way to live, but they would have no other choice to turn to begging in a longer term,” he said.

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Categories: Female employees, Kabul, News, Stay at home, Taliban

Afghanistan women’s football players arrive in Pakistan after fleeing Taliban

September 15, 2021 Article

Members of the Afghan women’s football team and their families have arrived in Pakistan after fleeing their country following the Taliban takeover, local media said.

It is unclear how many players and family members were allowed to enter in Pakistan.

According to Pakistan’s information minister Fawad Chaudhry, the players entered Pakistan at the north-western Torkham border crossing, holding valid travel documents.

“We welcome Afghanistan women football team,” he tweeted, providing no further details.

Pakistan’s English-language newspaper The Dawn said the footballers were issued emergency humanitarian visas after the Taliban takeover of Kabul.

The Taliban have not commented, but an official confirmed that under the government’s interpretation of Islam, women are not allowed to play any sports where they could potentially be exposed.

Last week, the Taliban announced an all-male interim government for Afghanistan stacked with veterans of their hardline rule from the 1990s and the 20-year battle against the US-led coalition.

The move seems unlikely to win the international support the new leaders need to avoid an economic meltdown.

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Categories: Afghan Women's Team, Flee, News, Pakistan, Taliban

MI5 boss issues terror warning over Afghanistan

September 10, 2021 Article

There is “no doubt” that events in Afghanistan will have “heartened and emboldened” extremists, the boss of MI5 said as he warned of the potential return of “al Qaida-style” terrorist plots.

Director-general Ken McCallum said that, although the Government has pledged to judge the Taliban by their actions, the UK security service and its partners will plan for the chance that “more risk, progressively, may flow our way”.

He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “There is no doubt that events in Afghanistan will have heartened and emboldened some of those extremists and so being vigilant to precisely those kinds of risks (is what) my organisation is focused on along with a range of other threats.”

While “inspired” acts of terrorism are “by volume” the largest number of threats that MI5 and their partners face in the UK, Mr McCallum also warned of the “potential regrowth of al Qaida-style directed plots”.

He said that although more directed plots from terrorist organisations take time to organise and carry out, psychological boosts for their causes can happen “overnight”.

“Terrorist threats tend not to change overnight in the sense of directed plotting or training camps or infrastructure – the sorts of things that al Qaida enjoyed in Afghanistan at the time of 9/11.

“These things do inherently take time to build, and the 20-year effort to reduce the terrorist threat from Afghanistan has been largely successful.

“But what does happen overnight, even though those directed plots and centrally organised bits of terrorism take a bit longer to rebuild… overnight, you can have a psychological boost, a morale boost to extremists already here, or in other countries.

“So we need to be vigilant both for the increase in inspired terrorism which has become a real trend for us to deal with over the last five to 10 years, alongside the potential regrowth of al Qaida-style directed plots,” Mr McCallum said.

His comments follow warnings he made during his annual address in July that terrorists will “seek to take advantage” of chances to “rebuild” as troops withdraw from Afghanistan, suggesting it could be “challenging” to disrupt potential threats without “having our own forces on the ground”.

Almost 20 years on from the 9/11 terror attacks in the US, Mr McCallum said it was “difficult to give a simplistic answer” as to whether the UK was safer, or less safe now from the threat of terrorism since 2001.

He said a consequence of the success of reducing large-scale terror events had been the growth of “inspired terrorism”. The so-called Islamic State had “managed to do something that al Qaida did not” in inspiring lots of people to attempt smaller scale acts of terrorism through online grooming.

“The number of plots that we disrupt nowadays are actually higher than the number of plots that were coming at us after 9/11, but on average they are smaller plots of lower sophistication,” Mr McCallum added.

He warned the threat of terrorism in the UK remains “a real and enduring thing”, describing how security services and police had disrupted 31 late-stage attack plots in Britain in the last four years.

Over the past two years during the coronavirus pandemic, six late-stage attack plots have been disrupted, he added, as he warned it would be “reckless” of him to claim that a terror attack would not happen on UK soil “on his watch”.

But he insisted those at MI5 “spend our lives” working to mitigate such threats.

One of the hardest things about being the boss of MI5 is the “prioritisation” of threats, Mr McCallum said, adding: “While we have, I can confidently say, saved thousands of lives across the last 20 years, we cannot always succeed.”

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Categories: Al Qaeda, Coronavirus, MI5, News, Taliban

New Zealand attacker radicalised by neighbours, mother says

September 8, 2021 Article

The mother of an extremist inspired by so-called Islamic State who stabbed shoppers in a New Zealand supermarket said her son was radicalised by neighbours from Syria and Iraq who helped him recover from an injury.

The attacker, Ahamed Aathil Samsudeen, was a 32-year-old Tamil Muslim from Sri Lanka.

He arrived in New Zealand 10 years ago on a student visa, and applied for refugee status on the basis of being persecuted in his home country.

Samsudeen was shot and killed by police, who said five people were stabbed and two injured in last week’s attack.

His mother, Mohamedismail Fareetha, said his descent into extremism began after he fell several storeys from a building in 2016 while at university.

“Because he did not have anyone there, it was people from Syria and Iraq who helped him.

“It looks like they brainwashed him. Then he started posting on Facebook,” she said in a phone interview on Saturday with a local TV station from her home in eastern Sri Lanka.

“He changed only after going abroad,” she added.

Police first noticed Samsudeen’s online support for terrorism in 2016, and the following year he was arrested at Auckland Airport.

He was heading for Syria, authorities say, and was later released on bail.

“After being arrested in 2017 he talked less with us, it was about once every three months,” his mother said, adding that two of her other sons “were angry with him and scolded him”.

In a statement Saturday, her son Aroos said his brother “would hang up the phone on us when we told him to forget about all the issues he was obsessed with.

“Then he would call us back again himself when he realised he was wrong. Aathil was wrong again yesterday. Of course we feel very sad he could not be saved.”

In 2018, Samsudeen was jailed for three years after he was found with IS videos and knives, and the following year his refugee status was cancelled after authorities found evidence of fraud.

Immigration authorities tried to argue he should remain behind bars, but in July, Samsudeen was released.

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Categories: Act of terrorism, Ahamed Aathil Samsudeen, New Zealand, News, radicalised, Stabbing attack, Tamil Muslim