Russians say Islamic State infiltrating domestic groups

The jihadi terror group Islamic State has begun “embedding” with Russian domestic terror organizations, including a leading Chechen resistance group, a top Russian intelligence official said Friday.

Russian Federal Security Service Deputy Director Sergei Smirnov made the claim while speaking with reporters at a summit of the Shanghia Cooperation Organization, a regional security alliance, meeting in Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

If true, it would be the latest sign that Islamic State, also known as ISIS and ISIL, is expanding its reach to other Islam-based terror groups beyond its base in Syria and Iraq.

Islamic State operatives “are beginning to embed themselves in other terrorist organizations,” Mr. Smirnov said, according to the Russian Interfax news service. “…Some field commanders of Imarat Kavkaz have vowed their allegiance to the Islamic State.”

Imarat Kavkax, or the Caucasian Emirate, has been fighting since 2007 to expel Russian forces from the restive Chechnya region, where Moscow has waged two savage wars against Chechen separatists. Russian officials have blamed Chechen terror groups for a string of attacks in the Caucasus and across the country, from the deadly 2004 seizure of a school in Beslan to the recent assassination of opposition politician Boris Nemtsov.

Several of Caucasian Emirate’s leaders have publicly pledged loyalty to Islamic State in recent months.

Mr. Smirnov told reporters that about 1,700 Russian nationals have traveled to Syria and Iraq to fight with ISIS, one of the highest contingent of foreign fighters to join the group.