Job: ‘Sniper’: Accused Daesh fighter on trial in US

Job: ‘Sniper’: Accused Daesh fighter on trial in US
In this courtroom sketch, Ruslan Asainov appears in court on Jan. 23, 2023, in New York. (AP/File)
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Updated 03 February 2023

Job: ‘Sniper’: Accused Daesh fighter on trial in US

Job: ‘Sniper’: Accused Daesh fighter on trial in US
  • Ruslan Maratovich Asainov kept a makeshift version of the militants' black flag right above the desk in his cell
  • The trial is a reminder of the enduring and far-reaching fallout of a war that drew tens of thousands of foreign fighters to Syria and Iraq

NEW YORK: He had been brought from the battlefields of Syria to a New York lockup, a US citizen charged with serving as a sniper and weapons trainer for the Daesh group.
And even in jail, Ruslan Maratovich Asainov kept a makeshift version of the militants’ black flag right above the desk in his cell, according to trial testimony this week.
“What’s the big deal? It’s mine. It’s religious,” then-jail lieutenant Judith Woods recalled him saying when she went to confiscate the hand-drawn image in 2020.
Years after the fall of the extremist group’s self-proclaimed Islamic caliphate, the trial is a reminder of the enduring and far-reaching fallout of a war that drew tens of thousands of foreign fighters to Syria and Iraq. Their home countries are still contending with what should become of them.
Jurors, who are expected to start deliberating as soon as Monday, have gotten a refresher course Daesh’s gruesome rule and its sophisticated, social-media-savvy recruitment of distant supporters to come and take up arms. Prosecutors say Asainov did so and rose through the group’s ranks, eventually becoming an “emir” who taught other members to use weapons.
In post-arrest videos shown at his trial, he gives his occupation as “a sniper” to FBI agents and readily tells them that he provided instruction in everything from rifle maintenance to ballistics to adjusting for weather effects — and, of course, “how to actually pull the trigger.”
“Oh, it’s a long lesson,” he explains, sitting on a bed in a room where he was being held. “I would give, like, a three-hour lesson, just on that, just to pull the trigger.”
Jurors have seen photos alleged to be of Asainov in camouflage, aiming a rifle, and the handmade flag that Woods said she took from his cell. Witnesses have included his flabbergasted ex-wife, who testified that he morphed from a Brooklyn family man into a zealot. She said he weighed in from Syria to complain about their daughter donning a Halloween costume and sent a photo of the bodies of what he said were comrades killed in a battle, according to the Daily News of New York.
Asainov chose not to testify. One of his lawyers, Susan Kellman, has said he went to Syria because he wanted to live under Islamic law. He has pleaded not guilty — a plea that Kellman entered on his behalf because, she said, he didn’t abide by the American legal system.
Nonetheless, the 46-year-old Asainov listened politely to government witnesses on a day this week, alternately stroking his beard and folding his arms across his chest.
Daesh fighters seized portions of Iraq and Syria in 2014 and declared the establishment of a so-called Islamic caliphate there, at a time when Syria was already convulsed by civil war. Fighting laid waste to multiple cities before Iraq’s prime minister declared the caliphate vanquished in 2017; the extremists lost the last of their territory two years later, though sporadic attacks persist even now.
During the height of the fighting, as many as 40,000 people from 120 countries showed up to join in, according to the United Nations. There is no comprehensive US statistic on Americans among those foreign fighters; a 2018 report by George Washington University’s Program on Extremism found at least 64 who had joined jihadist fighting in Iraq and Syria since 2011.
Since Daesh’s defeat, some foreign members and their families have lingered in detention facilities in Syria because their countries refused to take them back. Other accused foreign fighters have returned to their countries, including some who were prosecuted.
Recent US cases include a Kansas mother who led an all-female Daesh battalion, a Minnesota man who served in a battalion that prepared foreign fighters for suicide attacks in Europe, and a Detroit-area convicted this week of training with and then spending more than two years with the group.
Born in Kazakhstan, Asainov is a naturalized US citizen. He lived in Brooklyn starting in 1998, married and had a child.
Then he flew to Istanbul on a one-way ticket in December 2013 and made his way to Syria to join what he later described in a message as “the worst terrorist organization in the world that has ever existed,” authorities say.
“You heard of Daesh,” he said in another text message in January 2015, according to prosecutors’ court filings. “We will get you.”
By that April, Asainov told an acquaintance — in fact, a government informant — that he’d been fighting in Syria for about a year, according to court papers. They say that in various exchanges, he urged the informant to come to Syria and help with Daesh’s media operations, asked for $2,800 to buy a rifle scope, and sent photos of himself with fatigues and rifle, saying he “didn’t mean to show off” but was showing what was “just normal” in his new life.
Authorities announced in July 2019 that US-backed forces in Syria had captured Asainov and turned him over to the FBI.
He faces charges that include providing material support to a US-designated foreign terrorist organization. If convicted, he could be sentenced to life in prison.


UAE looks to more engagement with India ahead of G20 summit

UAE Ambassador to India Abdulnasser Jamal Al-Shaali speaks to Arab News in an interview on Tuesday. (AN photo)
UAE Ambassador to India Abdulnasser Jamal Al-Shaali speaks to Arab News in an interview on Tuesday. (AN photo)
Updated 10 sec ago

UAE looks to more engagement with India ahead of G20 summit

UAE Ambassador to India Abdulnasser Jamal Al-Shaali speaks to Arab News in an interview on Tuesday. (AN photo)
  • Bilateral relations received boost with last year’s free trade pact
  • Now UAE is also focusing on people-to-people relations, says envoy

NEW DELHI: The UAE wants to expand ties with India beyond the economic spectrum, Abu Dhabi’s envoy to New Delhi told Arab News, as the two countries are increasing engagement during the Indian presidency of the Group of 20 largest economies.

Economic ties between the two countries received a major boost when their Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement came into force in May last year. The landmark deal reduced tariffs on about 80 percent of all goods and provided zero-duty access to 90 percent of Indian exports.

“The momentum has been great. We have had many senior officials coming from the UAE and from India visiting the UAE. We have had quite a few ministers visit. We have a minister visiting almost every month. And non-oil bilateral trade is now above $40 billion and the target is $100 billion by 2027,” UAE Ambassador to India Abdulnasser Jamal Al-Shaali told Arab News in an exclusive interview on Tuesday.

“We are keen on expanding ties with India in every possible way, so not just in the bilateral spectrum of things, but also exploring trilateral, multilateral venues ... you would see us being very active as well in the G20 presidency by the Indian government.”

While Saudi Arabia is the only Middle Eastern country in the G20, India, which is chairing the group this year, can invite non-G20 members to its processes and meetings.

The UAE is India’s special guest — alongside Oman and Egypt — and will also take part in the group’s summit in September.

The growing representation of Middle Eastern countries will result in a “higher engagement between India and the countries in the region,” the UAE ambassador said.

“Alignment in the G20 is important not only between India and the countries in the Arab world, but also among the G20 countries and among the countries that get invited,” Al-Shaali said.

The Indian government, he added, has “made sure that it has a different kind of representation in the G20 meeting than what we have seen in the past few years, and this further affirms the commitment that India has to the region and, of course, it has the region’s support in its G20 presidency.”

While economic ties between New Delhi and Abu Dhabi are reaching new heights under last year’s trade pact, the UAE is also investing in people-to-people relations.

“We are only just starting,” Al-Shaali said. “We are focusing a lot on people-to-people ties. We have just signed an MoU on establishing cultural councils, the second chapter of the India-UAE business council has been established as well ... we are exploring all venues; we are expanding in the areas both countries are interested in.”


Slovakia offered $1bn in US arms in trade-off for Ukraine aid

Slovakia offered $1bn in US arms in trade-off for Ukraine aid
Updated 49 min 55 sec ago

Slovakia offered $1bn in US arms in trade-off for Ukraine aid

Slovakia offered $1bn in US arms in trade-off for Ukraine aid
  • "If we don't take them, they will go to another country," Defence Minister Jaroslav Nad said on Facebook
  • Slovakia announced on Friday that it would donate the MiG warplanes to Ukraine

BRATISLAVA: Slovakia on Wednesday said it had received a US offer of $1 billion in helicopters and missiles at a discounted rate in compensation for promising to send MiG-29 warplanes to Ukraine.
“We were the first to receive this extremely advantageous offer. If we don’t take them, they will go to another country,” Defense Minister Jaroslav Nad said on Facebook.
“The value of this material is slightly over $1 billion... Slovakia would pay around $340 million over a period of three to four years,” he added.
The offer includes 12 new Bell AH-1Z Viper helicopters with accessories, pilot and technician training, along with more than 500 AGM-114 Hellfire missiles, he said.
He noted that the offer was notably in compensation for the fighter jets that Bratislava had recently promised Ukraine.
“So let’s summarise: for 13 old MiGs and a part of the KUB air defense system, we have an offer” from the United States, he said.
Slovakia announced on Friday that it would donate the MiG warplanes to Ukraine, the second NATO member — following Poland — to pledge the aircraft.
The batch will include 10 operational MiG-29 fighter jets and an additional three to be used as spare parts. The KUB air defense system is also Soviet-era weaponry.
Slovakia plans to replace the jets with American F-16s, and the changeover should take place no later than January 2024.
Nad said Wednesday that the US deal was also intended to make up for the delay in delivering the F-16s.
“Thanks to our responsible defense policy, relations with the US and also our clear support of Ukraine, we were the first to receive this offer,” Nad said.
“It should also be seen in the context of indirect compensation for the delayed F-16 fighters, where we have long demanded some form of compensation.”


Earthquake kills 10 in Pakistan, at least four in Afghanistan 

Earthquake kills 10 in Pakistan, at least four in Afghanistan 
Updated 58 min 32 sec ago

Earthquake kills 10 in Pakistan, at least four in Afghanistan 

Earthquake kills 10 in Pakistan, at least four in Afghanistan 
  • Epicenter of quake was 40 km south-southeast of Jurm district in Afghanistan 
  • In 2005, at least 73,000 people were killed by 7.6 magnitude quake in northern Pakistan 

PESHAWAR: At least 10 people were killed in Pakistan and four in Afghanistan as a magnitude 6.5 earthquake struck large swathes of the two neighboring countries on Tuesday evening, officials said on Wednesday. 

The Provincial Disaster Management Authority for Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province said 10 people had been killed in the province and 62 were injured.  

“The provincial emergency center at PDMA, Rescue 1122 and district administrations are on high alert in case of aftershocks,” PDMA spokesperson Taimur Ali told Arab News. 

Bilal Faizi, a spokesperson for Rescue 1122, said: “The emergency phase was completed earlier tonight and soon the phase of relief and then rehabilitation will be initiated.”

He added that over 100 people who fell unconscious “out of shock and fear” during the tremors were also taken to nearby hospitals.   

The US Geological Survey said the epicenter of the magnitude 6.5 quake was 40 km south-southeast of the district of Jurm in Afghanistan’s mountainous Hindukush region, bordering Pakistan and Tajikistan. 

The quake struck 188 km deep below the Earth’s surface, causing it to be felt over a wide area. 

In neighboring Afghanistan, Sharafat Zaman Amar, a Taliban-appointed spokesman for the Public Health Ministry, said the earthquake killed four people and injured 70. 

He said casualties and damages were reported from different provinces. Two people died in the northern Takhar province and one child died in the eastern Laghman province.

A 6.1 magnitude earthquake in eastern Afghanistan killed more than 1,000 people last year. 

In 2005, at least 73,000 people were killed by a 7.6 magnitude quake that struck northern Pakistan. 


UK opens inquiry into unlawful killing claims in Afghanistan

UK opens inquiry into unlawful killing claims in Afghanistan
Updated 22 March 2023

UK opens inquiry into unlawful killing claims in Afghanistan

UK opens inquiry into unlawful killing claims in Afghanistan
  • Britain's government ordered the inquiry after lawyers brought legal challenges on behalf of the families of eight Afghans
  • Senior judge Charles Haddon-Cave said: "This is critical, both for the reputation of the armed forces and the country"

LONDON: A senior judge launched an independent inquiry Wednesday to investigate whether UK military police covered up or did not properly probe allegations of unlawful killings by British armed forces in Afghanistan from 2010 to 2013.
Britain’s government ordered the inquiry after lawyers brought legal challenges on behalf of the families of eight Afghans who were allegedly killed by British special forces during nighttime raids in 2011 and 2012.
Senior judge Charles Haddon-Cave said his team would “get to the bottom” of whether investigations carried out by the Royal Military Police were adequate.
“It is clearly important that anyone who has broken the law is referred to the relevant authorities for investigation. Equally, those who have done nothing wrong should rightly have the cloud of suspicion lifted from them,” Haddon-Cave said Wednesday. “This is critical, both for the reputation of the armed forces and the country.”
The inquiry into two separate incidents will also review whether the deaths “formed part of a wider pattern of extra-judicial killings by British armed forces in Afghanistan at the time.”
Thousands of British troops were deployed to Afghanistan as part of a two-decade-long NATO-led campaign in the country following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States. Many British soldiers engaged in heavy fighting with insurgents in southern Helmand province.
Britain ended all combat operations in Afghanistan in 2014, although a small number of troops stayed to train Afghan security forces until 2021, when the international coalition withdrew from the country.
Haddon-Cave said many hearings would have to be held behind closed doors for national security reasons.
Leigh Day, the law firm representing the families, said Ministry of Defense documents showed officers had widespread knowledge about unlawful killings by UK special forces in Afghanistan but did not report the information to military police.


Famous British Muslims show their support for anti-Islamophobia campaign in UK

Famous British Muslims show their support for anti-Islamophobia campaign in UK
Updated 22 March 2023

Famous British Muslims show their support for anti-Islamophobia campaign in UK

Famous British Muslims show their support for anti-Islamophobia campaign in UK
  • Launch event hosts a range of speakers from politicians to YouTube personality Chunkz
  • Initiative proposes enshrining UN-supported international day in law

LONDON: A number of famous British Muslims gathered in London on Monday to celebrate the launch of a campaign calling for the recognition in UK law of the UN-supported International Day to Combat Islamophobia.

The campaign’s launch, which was organized by the Aziz Foundation, took place at the Victoria and Albert Museum, and featured a diverse lineup of speakers, from politicians to creative personalities.

The UN General Assembly last year unanimously adopted a resolution designating March 15 as International Day to Combat Islamophobia. The date marks the anniversary in 2019 of the attacks on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, that killed 51 people.

And while Muslims make up five percent of Britain’s population, they are targeted in more than 40 percent of religiously motivated hate crimes, according to Home Office statistics.

Campaigners believe that enshrining the UN-supported day in law would send a strong message from the country’s government, which will lead to “transforming the public mood and creating a more equitable and inclusive society.”

Labour MP Naz Shah and Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, a member of the House of Lords, highlighted the entrenchment of Islamophobia in the UK during speeches at the event.

Warsi said: “It’s found in our streets but it’s also found in the most respectable of settings. It’s found in editorial newsrooms, think tanks, corridors of powers and around the respectable tables of polite society.”

Shah and Warsi conceptualized Islamophobia as being “rooted in racism, and is a type of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness.”

Among others in government, they argue that adopting it as a working definition in the UK would broaden an understanding that Islamophobia is more than just an expression of religious prejudice, but also an extension of systemic discrimination.

The politicians’ comments were echoed by Prof. Ahmed Shaheed, a UN special rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, who said that “you cannot challenge nor understand an issue until you name it.”

Shaheed discussed his efforts on building a global multi-stakeholder coalition to combat anti-Muslim hatred and Islamophobia. He criticized international governments for failing to condemn China and India’s targeting of their own Muslim communities.

Asif Aziz, the founder of the Aziz Foundation, was joined on stage by one of the biggest names on YouTube.

Chunkz, who has amassed 13 million followers across social media platforms, said that he has never shied away from being a Muslim and hoped to instill pride in his younger fans who share a similar background.

The YouTube personality added that while he has had a positive experience working in the industry, many female Muslim entertainers, particularly those who wear the hijab, felt pressure to compromise their faith.

He told Arab News: “Propaganda is a real thing.

“[Social media can] show how normal we are, and I say normal with quotes because a lot of people have probably got wrong information about Muslims and Islam in general.

“I think just being ourselves in itself is a good representation of how we really are in real life.”

Mariah Idrissi, who in 2015 became the first Muslim hijab-wearing model, underlined the importance of positive on-screen Muslim representation.

She said: “Art is such a powerful medium to get messages across.

“We see the impact of film, music, and fashion on the world without needing to preach or defend our way of life. It makes the journey towards peace more influential and enjoyable for everyone.”