Extra-judicial practices of the Russian Security Agencies

The domestic security agency of Russia (FSB) arrested a Muslim woman, Sidikova Oomidjan Ganevna (b. 1976) on the morning of 19 May 2011 in Moscow . They did not allow her to inform anyone of her whereabouts, and her three children – a daughter, Meerkhan (12), and two sons, Nusratullah (10) and Salahuddin (8) – were placed in an orphanage.


Earlier, on the 7 December 2010, the husband of Sidikova, Farookh Fadl Dinovic (b. 1972), was arrested upon allegations of membership with a political party, Hizb ut-Tahrir . His wife was then arrested in order to put pressure on him to confess to the allegations, which were not true. The court sentenced Sidikova to two months in prison.


We see today that Russian leaders are trying to portray Russia as a civilised nation that respects human rights, yet in reality this is how they act to achieve their objectives: by separating a mother and her children in order to force a man to confess to crimes he did not commit.
On 23 May, in the city of Ufa and its surroundings, security agencies carried out raids on homes without warrants and arrested some Muslim women from their homes.


The house of Manapova Yula Kazikhanov (b. 1984) was raided by officers of the National Security agency on 23 May 2011. Her house is apartment no. 617, 11 Moshanikova St. in the city of Ufa . They led her to 55a Kalinina St. and there threatened her with a screwdriver and awl and verbally abused her. They threatened her with the arrest of her sons as a form of pressure. They repeated all this throughout the day, whilst her baby and her infant of 5 years were left alone in the house.
The house of Elmira Minnibiva Yonnerova (b. 1985) was searched while she was eight months pregnant. She lives in Ufa on Kriliva St . The search was carried out in a way contravening the law: the address written in the legal papers was wrong and the two female witnesses used during the investigation were from the agency itself. The agents of the agency recorded everything on video in order to record the face of the sister properly. The name of employee recording was Vitslav and he focused the camera upon her. During all this, her husband, Tahir Vanisovic, and her one-year old son, Aleem, were in the apartment witnessing the actions of the agents, part of which was the trampling with their dirty feet on books that contained Quran’ic verses.


By this sort of conduct the agencies seeks to degrade the feelings of the believers.


The result of their practices appeared on the sister in the form of symptoms of pressure, increase in heart rate, and pain in the lower abdomen. The ambulance was summoned and, after examination, the doctor concluded that her condition was precarious and she may lose her child. He gave her a sedative and took her to natal hospital no. 6, located in Shaviva st, and after examination to the hospital, they refused her entry on grounds that it is full.
Caquerova Ramilva Leila, born in 1982, and having 4 small children – Zainab (6 years), Salah al-Din (4 years), Ali (2 years) and Jannat (1 year) – was put under pressure, her and her family, by the security agencies. Two cars arrived at her house at 7am on May 23, 2011 and many men exited. Among them were some women, and later it became apparent that they were witnesses over the inspection process. At this time the sister was leaving her house to go to meet her husband Albert Shakirov Zkjevic, who was sentenced to imprisonment in accordance with Article 282-1 since September 22 2010, and thus this family had already lost its breadwinner and patron. They stopped her and inspected her from all sides, and without any reason they forcibly pulled her mobile phone from her. Then they started to act according to old custom, showed her a warrant, and forced her to open the gate to enter the house. During the search for prohibited literary material they searched everything and moved everything out of its place, even the freezer in the refrigerator was not spared, despite the fact that all the books in the house were issued in this country. Still not satisfied with what they found, they began threatening to tear the panels of the walls which were made of wood. They began shouting, scaring the young children and waking them up from their sleep.


After interrogating the sister they took her to the section located in Kalenna St. , 55A, room no. 218. Then they started to talk and, in sum, they had prepared written note in which the sister’s confesses to being a fundamentalist and they wanted to force her to sign it. She ask to call a lawyer, and mentioned to them Article 51 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation , but this did not affect them. Rather, the response was a threat to imprison her and to take her children and place them in an orphanage. They began calling the management in order to find the address of the nearest orphanage, and they began waving a knife and awl at her face.
O Muslims: till when will these illegal and extra-legal practices against our wives, mothers, sisters and children continue? Till when will we remain silent and act as if nothing has happened to us? How will we answer Allah (swt) on the Day of Judgment when He asks us as to what we did to help our sisters and their children? Allah (swt) says;


[وَإِنِ اسْتَنصَرُوكُمْ فِي الدِّينِ فَعَلَيْكُمُ النَّصْر]


“And if they seek your help in the deen, than it is upon you to help them”; and at this point in time our brother, his wife and their children ask of our help. The Messenger of Allah (saw) said, “A Muslim is the brother of a Muslim: he does not oppress him, nor betray him. He who assists his brother, Allah assists him, and he who relieves a Muslim of a calamity, Allah will relieve him of a calamity on the Day of Resurrection. He who conceals a Muslim, Allah will conceal him on the Day of Resurrection” (Bukhari and Muslim), and he (saw) said, “Allah continues to assist his slave, so long as he assists his brother” and he said, “A Muslim is the brother of a Muslim: he does not oppress him, nor degrade him.” (Muslim)

Thus everyone who is able to protect or assist but does not do so will be considered as having left his brother without helping him. The Messenger of Allah (saw) said, “A Muslim does not abandon another Muslim in a place where he desires his help except that Allah will abandon him in a place where he desires the help of Allah.”


It is necessary that this incident impact us, and that each one of us partakes in freeing this Muslim family, in particular the sister and her children. We know, and we have been reminded again, that without the Imam these calamities will continue and be repeated. The Messenger of Allah (saw) said, “The Imam is a shield, behind whom the people fight and by whom they are protected.” The ruler of the Muslims protects the honour of the Muslim women, as was done in the past by the Prophet with Bani Qaynuqa’ and as Khalifah Mu’tasim did by sending an army in response to the call of a Muslim woman.


Dear Muslims: you are able to assist our brothers and sisters, first by making du’a for them that they be swiftly released. Second, we must spread the news of this incident to all the Muslims. Everyone must know about it. We must inform the Muslims and draw their attention to the like of these incidents. We must draw the attention of all segments of society and the media to this incident and to the extra-legal practices of the Government. We must demand that the prominent Muslims and Muslim activists partake in solving this problem.


O Muslims: help the deen of Allah, and He will help you. (End/)

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The Libya Contact Group: Colonial attempts to control a post-Gadhafi Libya

The Libya Contact Group met for the third time on Thursday 9th June 2011, the venue this time was the capital of the UAE, Abu Dhabi. All the usual suspects were there again with America and Britain leading the colonial attempt at usurping the uprising from the people of Libya, after hypocritically propping up Gadhafi for years with weapons, political and economic support.

The meeting came during the same week that the International Criminal Court (ICC) accused Gadhafi of using rape as a weapon against his own people. There is some gesturing towards Gadhafi being tried for war crimes. It was made clear from the first time the Libyan Contact Group met that its whole purpose is to oversee the transfer of power once Gadhafi is finally toppled.

By having these meetings in the Muslim lands the foreign powers be they America, Britain or France are trying to create an air of legitimacy for their intervention in Libya.
Their stooges in the Muslim world of course help these modern day colonists.

The lineup at the conference reads like a who’s who of betrayal. The Arab League who gave the green light for the attack on Libya were there. The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) attended once again showing their ineptitude at independent political thinking or action.

No one is fooled by the reasons why the West would even want to get involved in solving the problems of Libya. It has always been about ‘national interests’ something David Cameron made clear at the start of the bombardment.

However, Muslims must not be swayed by the fact western intervention was at the outset given the green light by Muslim leaders. By taking such a stance these despots were merely protecting their own fragile positions.

The Transitional National Council (TNC) which is effectively Libya’s government in waiting should be very wary of the plans of those who pretend to be their allies. Clinton et al may have pledged some funding for the TNC but there can be little doubt this will come at a price – the endgame will invariably be in America’s interests.

This is not what the young men in Benghazi, who were made shaheed in the first days of the protests, died for. Their call was for an independent and liberated Libya, not one ultimately under the authority of western colonists. History has proven western intervention provides nothing but humiliation to those it is meant to aid.

Allah (swt) says: “And when it is said to them : Do not make mischief in the earth, they say : Verily we are in fact peacemakers.” [TMQ: Al-Baqarah – 11](Ends)

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Heavy fighting in capital of Yemen

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Heavy fighting between anti-government rebels and forces loyal to president Ali Abdullah Saleh raged through Wednesday night and into Thursday in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen. Dozens of people were believed killed, many of them civilians caught in the crossfire between tribal militiamen and various factions of army troops.

At least three separate military conflicts were taking place across Yemen. In the capital city, as many as 200 people have been killed in ten days of fighting sparked by Saleh’s reneging on an agreement to step down as president after 33 years of authoritarian rule. It was the third time this year that Saleh has gone back on such a deal.

Other conflicts were taking place in the southern city of Taiz, where troops loyal to Saleh massacred unarmed demonstrators, killing an estimated 68 people, and in Zinjibar on the coast of the Gulf of Aden, where Saleh called in air strikes on his own citizens, claiming that “terrorists” linked to Al Qaeda had seized control of the town.

The fighting in Sanaa was both the bloodiest and the most immediately threatening to the survival of Saleh’s rule. A two-day ceasefire collapsed Tuesday night, with renewed gunfire between Saleh’s troops and militiamen headed by Sheikh Sadiq al-Ahmar, leader of the Hashed, the country’s largest tribe.

In a development that has ominous implications for the regime, tanks controlled by a dissident military officer, General Ali Mohsen, were said to have joined in action with the militiamen in clashes in the Hassaba district in the northern part of the capital, where most streets and large buildings are barricaded by the rival armed groups.

A government spokesmen said, “What was new in today’s clashes is the use of armored vehicles ... which the Ahmar don’t have.” The official, deputy information minister Abdu al-Janadi, said the headquarters of the ruling party, the General Peoples Congress, had been attacked.

The Yemeni defense ministry said that Special Forces, commanded by Saleh’s son Ahmed, had been deployed to retake government buildings held by al-Ahmar’s militiamen. Al Jazeera reported that another 2,000 tribesmen had entered Sanaa to reinforce al-Ahmar.

The British Guardian reported that the Presidential Guard, another elite unit under Saleh’s personal control, had attacked the headquarters of an armored brigade commanded by Brigadier General Mohammed Khalil, which had previously been considered neutral in the conflict.

The newspaper added that, “on Tuesday, Saleh imposed collective punishment on the Hassaba neighbourhood by cutting water supplies and electricity… There was also fighting for the first time in the Hada neighbourhood, a stronghold for Saleh supporters in the south of the capital. The interior ministry said in a statement that tribesmen had taken over a five storey building there after clashing with the army.”

The New York Times reported “large numbers of tribal fighters surging south toward the capital” and that “tanks and armored vehicles could be seen rolling to Sanaa” from the opposite direction to reinforce Saleh, suggesting that both sides were mobilizing forces for a final confrontation in the Yemeni capital.

Thousands of people were fleeing the city to escape the urban warfare. There were reports of young men forming defense committees to protect their homes and keep the fighters on both sides from using them as military positions.

The Saleh government has been under siege by a mass opposition protest movement for more than three months, with hundreds of thousands demonstrating for an end to his dictatorial rule and occupying main squares in Sanaa, Taiz, Aden and other cities. The regime responded with sporadic violence until last week, when full-blown civil war erupted in the capital.

Last Friday, for the first time, the Yemeni military launched air strikes against its opponents, using attack helicopters to target a military checkpoint seized by tribal militiamen at Al Fardha, east of the capital. This was followed by air strikes by fighter jets on Zinjibar Monday, which people in the city said had targeted residential areas.

Saleh has portrayed the armed opposition to his regime as inspired by Al Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula, an offshoot of the terrorist group founded by Osama bin Laden. Press reports, however, described the militants who seized control in Zinjibar as members of a group called the Aden Army, which fought in Afghanistan in the 1980s as part of the US-backed war against Soviet occupation forces, and then returned home and sided with Saleh in a 1994 civil war against secessionist rebels in southern Yemen.

The complex and murky conflict in Yemen has sent alarm bells ringing in the major imperialist centers, particularly Washington, a longtime sponsor of Saleh’s regime. Yemen has a key strategic position, with a long border with Saudi Arabia, the world’s leading oil exporter, and a long coastline, along the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, which is a key route for oil shipments from the Persian Gulf to Europe.

On Wednesday the White House announced that Obama’s counterterrorism adviser, John O. Brennan, would visit Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates this week to discuss “the deteriorating situation in Yemen.”

Brennan held talks with officials in Riyadh, the Saudi capital city, then traveled on to the UAE. Saudi Arabia and the UAE are the two strongest powers in the Gulf Cooperation Council, which groups the six oil-rich monarchies of the Persian Gulf.

The GCC negotiated previous deals with Saleh to leave power in return for amnesty for all crimes committed during his three decades of rule. But, each time he refused to sign or implement the agreement.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton called Saleh’s failure to carry out his promise to resign “a source of great conflict.” She told reporters in Washington, “We cannot expect this conflict to end unless President Saleh and his government move out of the way to permit the opposition and civil society to begin a transition to political and economic reform.”

What US imperialism means by “political reform” is the integration of a section of the bourgeois opposition into positions of power, while “economic reform” means further opening up Yemen to machinations of the multinational corporations and Western banks.

It is quite likely that the rebellion by the tribal forces headed by Sadiq al-Ahmar, as well as the split in the Yemeni military, are prompted by pressure from Washington to push Saleh out of power as quickly as possible.

The Pentagon and CIA have longstanding relations with Yemeni officers like General Ali Mohsen, with the US having supplied some $200 million in military aid to the impoverished country over the last four years.

The so-called tribal forces are closely linked to imperialism as well. Sadiq al-Ahmar’s brother, Hamid al-Ahmar, is both a billionaire and a main leader of Islah (Reform), the moderate bourgeois party that is being groomed to play a major role in a restructured Yemeni government.

The imperialist powers, the Gulf monarchies, and the various bourgeois factions in Yemen are all in agreement on the overriding necessity to block any popular revolution from below, which would threaten to spread beyond Yemen’s borders and challenge their interests throughout the Arabian peninsula. (WSWS) 

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