(Affiliate of the WSN-Athens & Southeastern Europe Office)
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Note: Darko Trifunovic is a lawyer based in Belgrade, Serbia and Montenegro and working as lecturer at the Faculty of Security University of Belgrade. He is a specialist in Terrorist and Security Studies, and was the author among other books & studies in 2002 of the study: Islamic Fundamentalists, Global Network and Modus Operandi: Model Bosnia Part I, and in 2004 Islamic Fundamentalists, Global Network and Modus Operandi: Model Bosnia, Part II published by the Documentation Center of the Government of Republica Srpska's Bureau for Relations with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. Mr. Trifunovic was previously a diplomat (First Secretary) in the foreign service of Bosnia &Herzegovina at UN and in 2005 Adviser to the Minister of Interior of the Republic of Srpska, BIH. Since 2004, Darko Trifunovic was designate as representative for Serbia and Montenegro of International Strategic Studies Association (ISSA), Defense & Foreign Affairs publications, the Global Information System (GIS). Prof. Darko Trifunovic is Chief Editor of the prestigious University international bulletin "Security in Serbia"
Q: Do you believe that organized crime activities in the Balkans play an integral role as far as the regional developments are concerned?
A: While terrorists and criminal syndicates have different motivations, they both seek financial gain – only terrorists see it as a source of funding their ideological pursuits. As a result, terrorist networks in cooperation with organized crime syndicates generate significant sums of money. Both parties profit from cooperation. Terrorists provide drug supplies, weapons and contacts to drug-makers and smugglers worldwide. They also provide safe havens for organized crime syndicates, because they often control large territories where there is no rule of law. On the other hand, the terrorists can use smuggling routes and illicit trade goods. Both groups gather and exchange intelligence on corrupt state officials in all branches of government. Islamic fundamentalists, including Al-Qaeda members, realize profits from drug trade in two ways. One is by taking a percentage from the local criminal syndicates, and the other is taking a portion of illicit substances transported towards Western Europe. Profits from those drug sales are used by the terrorists to purchase arms and offer bribes, but increasingly often as well for hiring professional PR and lobbying firms to come up with political justifications of Islamic fundamentalist terrorists.
Q: I would like to ask your opinion around the spread of Islamic fundamentalism in the Balkans and its implications for the countries in the region?
A: The territory of Bosnia-Herzegovina has become a haven for a widespread network of organized crime. Wars, economic crises, social, political and other upheavals have all created fertile soil for this malaise. The primary objective of organized crime is acquisition of material wealth; this is accomplished through illicit activities with a high rate of return on investment: drug-smuggling, gunrunning, prostitution, trade in human organs and persons, etc. Corruption appears alongside organized crime. In Bosnia-Herzegovina (hereafter: BH) , corruption is endemic, ranging from abuse of police power and suspicious privatization deals to involvement in smuggling of high-tariff goods, copyright piracy, gunrunning and human trafficking. Problems multiply and there are no solutions in sigh. Few believe the authorities' declarations of readiness to confront local and regional crime syndicates.
One of the biggest problems is certainly the drug trade, which directly affects EU countries. Seventy percent of all heroin shipments arriving to the EU traverse three Balkans routes. BH is part of one of the routes, but is increasingly becoming a storage zone for illicit narcotics and an emerging market, as the number of users grows. Local crime syndicates are connected with Albanian, Kosovo, Serb, Turkish and Bulgarian mafias. There are two heroin routes into BH: One starts in Afghanistan, through Turkey, Greece, Albania and Serbia, and then through BH westwards. The second starts in Albania, and then goes across Montenegro into southern BH and Croatia, to proceed into Western Europe.
Heroin and other substances are abundant in BH – in restaurants, cafe, schools, in universities – and general dissatisfaction with quality of life has enabled the crime syndicates to recruit users and pushers among the youth. They used patriotism as a cover for their criminal activities during the war. Afterwards, however, a portion of the Muslim population in BH replaced nationalism with a new ideology of Islamic fundamentalism. Islamic fundamentalists with a criminal background have substantial advantages in BH:
1. Fast and easy access to weapons and explosives;
2. In-depth knowledge of smuggling routes;
3. Connections with corrupt officials and politicians;
4. Influence in local media and NGOs;
5. Connections with a large Diaspora in the US and Western Europe
Terrorist networks have seized upon these advantages of local criminals-turned-Islamic fundamentalists, creating a new model of terrorist funding.
Q: Are there any practical measures implemented in order to curb the presence of extremism in the Balkans; especially under an international cooperation framework?
A: Yes. All the measures need to be taken between the Balkan governments. Besides that, an essential role has to be allocated for the scientific researchers, professors, analysts and particularly for the journalists. We need to educate population about great dangers from the Islamic fundamentalists.
Q: Lastly, do you believe that there is a strong linkage between the organized crime in the Balkans and the spread of Islamic terrorism activities?
A: The Western Balkans has been a region of interest to Islamic extremists for decades. Numerous Muslims living in the so-called "Green Traverse" represent both a recruitment pool and a springboard for attacks in Western Europe. Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and the Raska region ( a.k.a. Sanjak) are frequently used as Jihad's gateway into the European heartland. The notion is not new, only more visible today than ever before.
Recent discoveries in BH indicate that the trend of terrorist organizations funding themselves from drug sales is on the rise, due to a series of factors: Financial scrutiny and closing of so-called "humanitarian" organizations that were terror fronts; Greater pressure on state sponsors of terrorism, resulting in their inability to funnel money to terrorists openly; Increase in supply of heroin coming from Afghanistan; connections between Islamic fundamentalists and organized crime syndicates.
Of special consideration is the fact that Islamic terrorists have a widespread network of members and supporters in BH, which is used for trafficking in people, weapons and increasingly drugs. Due to this, one can purchase a kilo of heroin in BH through the "mujahedin connection" for anywhere between 11.000 and 13.000 EUR. The street value would be three or four times more, because pure heroin is laced with other substances.
The BH capital has become the base of a narco-cartel. After the murder of Lullzim Krasniqi in Croatia, one of the major drug-dealers on the Balkans route, the investigation which took place in several countries uncovered the existence of a widespread network composed of criminals and former soldiers from the BH Army. Almost all of them are Kosovo Albanians or Sanjak Muslims. Krasniqi's murder was linked to a large shipment of drugs via Kosovo, Sanjak, BH, Croatia and into Austria, where a portion was supposed to be retained for local distribution and the rest shipped to Germany, Switzerland and the rest of the EU. Distribution was to be handled by numerous members of the Krasniqi family living in Graz and the surrounding areas.
Krasniqi's main partners in Kosovo are Florim Maloku, Arben Viti, Dauti Kurtalli, Besim Ismaili, Ismet Osmani and EKREM (Kurtesh) LLUKA, a.k.a "Vuka" linked to radical Islamic circles in Syria Ekrem Luka is the owner of the company "Banana" and close friend with Bexhet Pacoli. Bexhet Pacoli is very close friend of Raumus Haradinaj.
Krasniqi was well-connected with two leading criminal figures in BH - Ramiz Delalić – Ćelo, leader of the Sanjak underground, and Naser Kellmendi, one of the most influential Albanians in Sarajevo. One of Kellmendi's closest associates, considered to be his connection to the criminal and terrorist circles in Kosovo, is "Jackie" Rugovcu of Peć, who is also well-connected with Ekrem Lluka. Rugovcu had two separate channels for transporting weapons, drugs and prostitutes. Suad Musić was in charge of the Montenegro channel, while the Sanjak route was managed by Safet Kalić – Sajo, close to major criminal syndicates in Kosovo and inner Serbia. Suad Music and Safet kalica are cousins.
Other notable individual in the organized crime network that finances Islamic terrorism in the Balkans are Halil Emrovic from Sanjak. Halil Emrovic is in charge of the heroin route from Turkey through Sanjak, BH and onwards to the West. He controls the heroin network supplies in Belgrade, Sarajevo and Varazdin in Croatia.
Emrović is the owner of "Edihal" textile plant in Novi Pazar, which is the cover for his heroin smuggling from Turkey through Kosovo and Croatia. Trucks transporting denim from Turkey are used for smuggling large quantities of heroin. One of these shipments was intercepted in Hungary recently, when 113 kilos of heroin was found in a truck driven by Emrović's cousin, Zamo ( a.k.a. "Zamorano") and Muzafer Bihorac. The heroin was received from brothers Semir and Munir, who own a textile factory in Istanbul, and was destined for a contact in Zagreb named Franjo. After the arrest of Nirso Hadžipećanina in Croatia and the seizure of 164 additional kilos of heroin that had been transported by bus from Sarajevo, Emrović got into trouble with the Sarajevo underground, which suspected him of being involved in the seizures. His contact in Istanbul is Hajro Aljković, and in Croatia Mensur Bibić "Meljo", both from Novi Pazar.