Salafi Penetration Outside Tatarstan

Salafi activities have not been limited to Tatarstan; they were also recorded during the 1990s and 2000s in Bashkortostan, specifically the Agidel, Baymak, October, and Sibai districts and the capi-tal Ufa; in Belozerye, Mordovia; Togliatti in the Samara region; as well as in the Orenburg, Penza, Perm, Ulyanovsk regions.

In 1994 Ayub (Anguta) Omarov, a Salafi preacher of Dagestani descent, founded his own group of Muslims in Astrakhan. The group’s composition was mixed and included ethnic Avars (the majority), Russians, Tatars, and children of mixed marriages. Omarov identified himself and his followers as Mu’mins (“real” believers who completely submitted to the will of Allah) and rhe-torically tried to differentiate this identity from Saudi-originated Islam. His primary focus was on religious piety in everyday life—namely, no alcohol, smoking, or personal photos—and he tried to stay out of politics. After the second Chechen campaign, he took a cautious position and blamed the violence on all of the sides that had been engaged in the conflict. This approach placed him at odds with both radicals and the o_cial Islamic structures, so in 2000 he left Astrakhan looking for a safe haven. The total membership of this group and one led by the Abdurazakov brothers, ethnic Avars in Astrakhan, amounted to about 300 people.

In 1997, an Astrakhan Salafi named Abuzar 6began to preach in the village of Belozerye, in the Romodanovsk District of the Republic of Mordovia. He was able to attract the local rural youth as well as some others from the neighboring Tatar villages of Inyat and Aksenovo. A year later the village was the focus of attention due to growing tensions between radicals and “tradi-

tionalists.” In fact, in Mordovia there was an attempt to replicate the Dagestan scenario, obtaining Islamist control of a separate village.

Salafis also expanded into Belozerye. Ruslan Ahmyarov, a native of Belozerye and graduate of the Al-Furqan Madrassa, was wanted by the federal law-enforcement forces for his involvement in the bombing of two houses in Moscow in 1999. During the second Chechen campaign a group of Belozerye “Wahhabis” took part in the fighting on the side of the rebels and then returned

62. A muhtasib is a Muslim functionary keeping vigilant watch on the execution of the shari’a norms. 63. Viktorin, Islam v Astrakhanskom regione, p. 79.

64. Rais Suleimanov, “Islamsliy terrorism v sovremennom Tatarstane: Wahhabism na praktire” [Islamic terrorism in present-day Tatarstan: Wahhabism in practice], Agency for Political News, July 25, 2012, http:// www.apn.ru/publications/article26923.htm.

65. Metshin recorded and posted a video on his website in which he said, “We will burn the all traces of Wahhabism with the hot iron.” I. Metshin: “S Luybymi proyavleniyami Wahhabizma nuzhno zhestko

borot’sya” [I. Metshin: It’s necessary to fight hard against all forms of Wahhabism], July, 23, 2012 http://www. metshin.ru/video/6858.

66. Abuzar was an ethnic Russian who changed his name from Oleg Marushkin when he converted to Islam.

20 |the rise of radical and nonofficial islamic groups in russia’s volga region

home with arms. Later, the activities of the Belozerye Jamaat declined substantially, but the vil-lage itself and its surroundings remained of special interest for the republican authorities and the law-enforcement and special services. In the summer of 2011, Belozerye native Fyarit Nevlyutov, nicknamed Abdullah-Tatar, was arrested after having been implicated in the bombing attempt on a passenger train that was traveling between Moscow and Saint Petersburg. Another native of the village, Rasim Bashirov, was arrested in Tajikistan while serving as a militant under the auspices of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.67

In 2004, several students from the Al-Furqan Madrassa were involved in a terrorist attack on a school in Beslan, in North Ossetia. In September 2005, the madrassa was the object of an investi-gation during which both extremist literature and an arsenal of explosives were found. Following the 2005 investigation, the madrassa was closed. During the same period, authorities neutralized an organized criminal group in the Ulyanovsk region whose members used one of their private apartments as a “mosque” and often discussed various methods for fighting against the “infidels.” In 2010, the final member of this group was sentenced. 8

Salafi views have also penetrated the ranks of ethnic nationalists in republics outside of Tatarstan. As a result, ideas of ethnic superiority have become inextricably mixed with religious intolerance and radicalism. In December 2011 Fanzil Akhmetshin, deputy chairman of the Inter-national Union of Public Associations of the World Kurultay of Bashkirs, was accused of orches-trating activities that were aimed at inciting religious hatred. Speaking in the Baimak District of Bashkortostan, Akhmetshin promoted the superiority of Salafi ideas over the other branches of Islam and justified Salafi incitements to physical violence against opponents of the doctrine. In 2010, he contributed his ideas to the Oran newspaper, a publication of the Bashkir Youth Union. The Kirov district court of Ufa later declared these materials as extremist. 9