On the margins of the terrorist attack in Krasnogorsk. Examples of financing for the Islamic State-Khorasan Province

Abstract

On 22 March 2024 in Krasnogorsk near Moscow, the Islamic State-Khorasan Province (ISIS-K) carried out a terrorist attack at the Crocus City Hall concert hall. The Russian side put forward the thesis that Ukraine was the inspirer of the attack and ISIS-K was merely its executor. The aim of the article is to refute this idea on the basis of an analysis of the sources of funding for the attack and of the organisation itself, which had already engaged in terrorist activity against the Russian state and its citizens, relating, among other things, to Russian actions during the Chechen War II fought between 1999 and 2009. The article draws on open sources of information in the form of the findings of US State Department and the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation as well as analyses of ISIS-K activity between 2015 and 2024 by think tanks or independent experts.