Russia detains “Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami” suspected supporters

Thirteen citizens of the Central Asian countries suspected of involvement in terrorism have been detained in Russia’s Rostov-on-Don city.

Presumably, they were part of a cell of the international terrorist organization Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami, Russia-based news service Kommersant reports, citing the public relations centre of the Russian Federal Security Service.

The detainees are suspected of spreading terrorist ideology in Russia. “In the process of secret meetings, they recruited Russian residents from among local Muslims and labour migrants into their ranks,” the report said.

At the places of residence of the detainees, materials, means of communication and electronic information devices of Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami prohibited in Russia were found and confiscated. A criminal case has been initiated against the suspected organizer of the work of the cell.

Hizb ut-Tahrir (Arabic: حزب التحرير, romanized: Ḥizb at-Taḥrīr, lit. 'Party of Liberation; HT) is an international pan-Islamist and fundamentalist political organization which describes its ideology as Islam, and its aim the re-establishment of the Islamic caliphate (Arabic: خِلَافَة, khilāfah) to unite the Muslim community (Arabic: أمة, ummah)[3] and implement Islamic law (Arabic: شريعة, sharia) globally.

The party was founded in 1953 as a political organization in then-Jordanian-controlled Jerusalem by Taqi al-Din al-Nabhani, an Islamic scholar from Haifa who was educated in Egypt and served as a qadi (religious court judge) in Mandatory Palestine.

Hizb ut-Tahrir has been banned in China, Germany,[13] Russia, Turkey,[14] Indonesia,[15][16] and all Arab countries except Lebanon, Yemen and the UAE.