The head of Russia’s Federal Security Service has alleged that the Khorasan branch of ISIS, associated jihadist groups, and anti-Taliban armed opposition are actively working to weaken the Taliban administration with the “active support of British intelligence services.” According to him, these groups are specifically seeking to expand areas beyond Taliban control, particularly in northern Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
Alexander Bortnikov made these remarks on Tuesday, May 25, at a meeting of the Council of Heads of Security and Intelligence Agencies of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The Russian state news agency TASS reported that he emphasized Western hopes to use northern Afghanistan as leverage to influence the affairs of Central Asian republics in the future.<\/p>\n
The Russian official also reported an increase in ISIS-Khorasan’s recruitment activities, stating that the group is actively recruiting citizens from Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, as well as migrant workers from these countries residing in Russia. He said that covert networks, supply channels, and attack planning are currently being developed within the CIS territories.<\/p>\n
Bortnikov alleged that the Russian security service, in cooperation with Tajikistan, identified and thwarted a terrorist cell early this year that was planning “high-profile attacks.” He added that with the cooperation of Uzbekistan’s State Security Service, five planned attacks in various parts of Russia, including Moscow, were foiled.<\/p>\n
He further stressed the expansion of anti-terrorism contacts with Taliban authorities, stating that Moscow pursues these collaborations as part of broader efforts to strengthen political stability in Afghanistan and normalize relations between Kabul and Islamabad. According to him, regional security depends on the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan.<\/p>\n
While Russia emphasizes security cooperation with the Taliban administration, it simultaneously expresses concerns over threats emanating from Afghan territory. Moscow is the only country to have officially recognized the Taliban administration, but Russian officials have repeatedly warned that instability in Afghanistan poses a major security threat within the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) region.<\/p>\n
Previously, Sergey Shoigu, Secretary of Russia’s Security Council, stated that ongoing instability in Afghanistan remains one of the main regional security challenges. Nearly five years after the Taliban\u2019s return to power, Russia and China continue to stress that security threats emerging from Afghanistan persist. This highlights that the Taliban administration has so far failed to convincingly address regional concerns over controlling extremist groups.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Russia claims ISIS-Khorasan operates with UK intelligence support to undermine the Taliban, increasing recruitment and threats in Central Asia and Russia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13771,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13772","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-important-news","category-international"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13772","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13772"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13772\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13772"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13772"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/atlaspress.news\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13772"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}