Chechen Jihadis Reject Tsarnaevs (OSC)

By Juan Cole, Informed Comment

23 April 13

The USG Open Source Center translates a reaction from the Caucasus Emirate Islamic insurgency on the news that the Tsarnaev brothers are accused of the Boston Marathon bombing. The CEII casts doubt on their guilt and also on the plausibility that these are jihadis, given their internet profiles at Russian-language sites. It does not claim them. For more on the CEII, see this 2011 article at the Middle East Policy Council

Chechen jihadist website reacts to identification of Boston bombers
Kavkaz-Tsentr
Friday, April 19, 2013
Document Type: OSC Translated Text

ext of a report in Russian by Chechen rebel internet news agency Kavkaz-Tsentr; subheading inserted editorially

The story of the Boston bombings is gaining greater and greater prominence. After the US government announced the suspects to be two natives of Dagestan, apparently, ethnic Chechens Dzhokhar and Tamerlan Tsarnayev, interest in the Russian mass media in the Boston bombing grew sharply.

Articles are coming out one after another with various types of allusions, and several commentators have begun to mockingly poke at the USA with their profuse talk: "Look, now (Russian President Vladimir) Putin and (Syrian President Bashar al-) Asad are laughing at the USA, which is supporting the terrorists in Syria."

Meanwhile, the story of the brothers itself remains very complicated, although it is hard not to miss the PR component of all of this.

For example, the name of one of the "terrorists", who is by the way only 19 years old, as if it was ordered, is Dzhokhar [Ar. Jawhar, i.e. gem, essence, also a 20th Chechen nationalist], an easily recognizable "brand" that explicitly ties the "perpetrators of the terrorist act" in Boston to Chechnya.

… It is still not clear what happened with Tamerlan Tsarnayev, why did the shoot-out start. Reports that the brothers attacked the police, stole a car and did many other things, rather than lay low and wait, seem strange at the very least.

The US authorities have said that they are searching for the surviving 19-year-old youth.

Blast suspects' background

By the way, about the brothers. They practically did not live in Chechnya, and the younger one was actually born in Kyrgyzstan. From there they immigrated to the USA. Judging by Dzhokhar Tsarnayev's VKontakte page, he appears to be far from the image of an "Islamic terrorist". He described career and money as his main credo. And besides, he had visited his page on the Russian social networking site literally just a few hours ago.

On the website of the Cambridge School (Cambridge Rindge & Latin School), where Tsarnayev studied, says that in February 2011 he won the title of "athlete of the month". Such famous people as (actors) Ben Affleck and Matt Damon graduated from this educational institute.

As for his older brother, 26-year-old Tamerlan Tsarnayev, as it became known, started training to become a boxer and was preparing to become a member of the US Olympic team.

According to his personal statements, had Chechnya not received independence, he would try to become a member of the US team rather than the Russian team. This information is included in the profile of the Wai Kru Mixed Martial Arts centre, where he was training to become a boxer.

Tsarnayev's photo gallery also says the same. He said that he would sooner become a member of the US team than the Russian team. The boxer added that so far he could not make it to the national team, because he did not have US citizenship, but he hoped to receive it in the future.

During his conversation with a photographer, the sportsman said that he was ready to become a member of the Chechen team only if it (Chechnya) becomes independent.

Tamerlan Tsarnayev had been living in the USA since he was five years old. He studied engineering at Bunker Hill Community College in Boston.

The Americans found his YouTube page, where he accumulated videos that he liked. It is interesting that one of the videos that Tamerlan Tsarnayev liked was "how I converted to Islam and become a Shi'a".

The Americans have already concluded that Tamerlan could be linked to "Al-Qa'ida". Apart from the video on Islam, one of the videos was devoted to the Black Flag anarchist organization. According to the Mother Jones portal, Al-Qa'ida was the alleged protector of the member of the Black Flag.

Meanwhile, foreign correspondents trying to phone Chechnya have reported that (Chechen leader Ramzan) Kadyrov's spokesperson had turned off his phone. He did not want to speak with journalists about the Boston events.

There is one interesting detail. The Economist's Moscow correspondent, Joshua Yaffa, recalled that earlier this week, Putin's Sport Minister (Vitaliy Mutko) said that the blast in Boston was a wake-up call for the upcoming (2014) Olympics in Sochi. This is yet another linkage with "terrorists in the Caucasus".