ASTANA (TCA) — Kazakhstan’s National Security Committee says a group of radical Islamists that was arrested in recent weeks in the southern region of Almaty planned to hijack a plane and conduct “a 9/11-like” attack, RFE/RL reports.
The Committee said on September 5 that another group apprehended in the central Karagandy region in June planned terrorist attacks against local infrastructure and a Russian military facility near the lake of Balkhash.
According to the Committee, three more groups arrested between August 12 and 30 in the regions of Western Kazakhstan and Aktobe planned a series of terrorist attacks against police and civilians.
According to the National Security Committee, a citizen of Kyrgyzstan and two Kazakhstan citizens with previous convictions were arrested on August 18. The Kyrgyz citizen was the leader of the terrorist cell, and one of the Kazakh members of the group was ready to become a suicide bomber, the Committee said, adding that they planned terrorist acts in crowded places. The Committee seized chemical components for explosive devices and extremist literature.
The Committee said that right before committing terrorist acts, the arrested planned to post a video on the Internet to explain the attacks as religiously motivated.
The National Security Committee said that eight radical Islamist groups had been apprehended in Kazakhstan since January.
In June, Kazakh authorities said a group of 25 alleged Islamic militants carried out a series of attacks that killed five civilians and three members of Kazakhstan’s security forces in the northwestern city of Aktobe. Security forces who confronted the group killed 18 gunmen and arrested seven others.
