Attack German chancellery, airport: IS

Islamic State claims bombing in Dagestan

BERLIN, March 31, (Agencies): Islamic State posted pictures on the Internet calling on German Muslims to carry out Brussels-style attacks in Germany, singling out Chancellor Angela Merkel’s offices and the CologneBonn airport as targets, the SITE intelligence group reported.

Western Europe is on high security alert after last week’s Islamic State suicide bombings in the Belgian capital that killed 32 people at its airport and in a metro station. On Wednesday, France said it was investigating a man on suspicion of planning an imminent act of “extreme violence”.

The Islamic State images and graphics, widely published by German media on Thursday, included slogans in German inciting Muslims to commit violence against the “enemies.”

Germany’s BKA federal police, who monitor suspected militants with German passports returning from stints fighting in Syria and Iraq, said it knew of the images but that their publication did not necessitate extra security measures.

“We are aware of this material and our experts are checking it,” a BKA spokeswoman said. “It is clear that Germany is the focus of international terrorism and that attacks could happen, but this material doesn’t change our security assessment.”

Federal police chief Holger Muench said after the March 22 attacks in Brussels that Islamic State appeared eager to carry out further “spectacular” attacks in Europe as it was suffering setbacks on battlefields in Iraq and Syria.

One of the disseminated Islamic State images features a militant in combat fatigues standing in a field and gazing at Cologne-Bonn airport with a caption reading: “What your brothers in Belgium were able to do, you can do too.”

Another shows the German chancellery building in Berlin on fire with an Islamic State fighter and a tank standing outside the structure. The headline reads: “Germany is a battlefield.”

Germany joined the US-led air strike campaign against Islamic State in Syria last year, though limiting its role to reconnaissance and refuelling missions, after the jihadist group killed 130 people in shooting and bombing attacks in Paris.

A third graphic featured a military jet, which German media identified as a Tornado used by the German air force, against the backdrop of a mountainous area juxtaposed with the bloodied faces of women and children -- apparently meant to represent civilians who Islamic State says have been killed by air strikes on areas it controls.

Meanwhile, German prosecutors say they have indicted a 25-year-old Islamic extremist on charges of being a member of two terrorist organizations fighting in Syria.

Federal prosecutors say German citizen Shahid Ilgar Oclu S., whose last name wasn’t provided due to privacy rules, traveled to Syria in the fall of 2013 and joined the group Junud al-Sham.

In a statement Thursday, prosecutors said he “underwent weapons training and learned to use a firearm” but left the group after a few weeks “disappointed about the lack of combat missions.” They say the suspect then joined the Islamic State group. He returned to Germany via Turkey on Dec 23, 2013.

The man was arrested March 7 by

police in the western city of Cologne.

BEIRUT:

Also:

The Islamic State jihadist group has claimed responsibility for a suicide attack that killed a policeman in Russia’s volatile region of Dagestan.

An IS fighter “detonated his explosives belt at a checkpoint of the Dagestani police ... killing and wounding several of them,” according to an IS statement distributed online.

Local police had said Wednesday’s attack had involved either a car exploding at the checkpoint or the occupants of a vehicle throwing an explosive device at a police car. One policeman was killed and another wounded, officials said.

The attacks came after Syrian troops backed by Russian forces secured an important victory against IS by recapturing the ancient city of Palmyra, which the jihadists had overrun in May last year. Attacks against police are not uncommon in the North Caucasus region, which faces a simmering Islamist insurgency.

Islamist rebels from Dagestan, which lies immediately east of Chechnya, are known to have travelled to join IS. Last year the group declared it had established a “franchise” in the North Caucasus.

Romania is planning to follow Poland and Hungary in widening its anti-terrorism laws after Islamic State attacks in Brussels, signalling growing concern among some eastern European countries over the threat of Islamist militants.

None of the three countries has ever come under attack by Islamist militants and none has a sizeable Muslim population.

But after the Brussels attacks killed more than 30 people and wounded dozens, the three countries appear to be getting nervous that they too could be targeted.

By the end of the year, Romania is looking to expand a list of crimes to include training in militant camps and spreading propaganda and recruiting online, Liviu Codirla, a member of Romania’s parliamentary committee overseeing the SRI secret service, told Reuters.

Codirla’s comments echoed sentiments expressed by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban who ordered the interior ministry to draw up new anti-terrorist laws shortly after the Brussels attacks.

“The target of the ... bombings was Europe, not Brussels, so Hungary has to consider itself under attack even though luckily it happened outside Hungarian territory,” Orban said.

The proposed changes in Hungary would allow the government to access data servers of private phone and internet providers and to prioritise official communications in the event of a disruption of public systems.

A draft of Poland’s new anti-terrorism bill presented last week allows the state security agency to conduct surveillance of foreign suspects for up to three months without prior court approval.

It allows for suspects to be held for 14 days without charges but with court approval, and for foreigners to be immediately deported if considered a threat. It also regulates the sale of payas-you-go SIM cards.