Terrorism case highlights the risk of returning terrorists funding ISIS
In spring 2016, an alleged Islamic State fighter named Ahmed Musto returned from Syria, settled into a business processing tobacco for hookah pipes in the Bulgarian capital and started a family, according to court documents and Bulgarian authorities.
Last September, authorities raided the business and arrested Mr. Musto. Far from leaving the militant group behind, Mr. Musto sent proceeds from the business to Islamic State in Syria, according to law-enforcement officials.
Mr. Musto faces charges related to terrorism as well as to the tobacco business, according to court documents and a statement from Bulgarian prosecutors. Through his lawyers, Mr. Musto denied the charges and denied having any links to Islamic State.
Islamic State has lost most of the territory it once held in Syria and Iraq, and Western authorities have long worried that some of the estimated 5,000 European Union residents who fought on its side could come back and initiate terrorist attacks at home. Of the 1,700 French citizens who joined Islamic State’s ranks, 302 had returned to France by November, according to the government. Around 360 of Britain’s roughly 850 fighters are back home, according to a British official.
So far, the worries have been largely unrealized. But an emerging concern is that returning fighters could also raise money to help Islamic State replenish its depleted coffers and potentially fund terrorist attacks by others.
The fear is that “returnees could be collecting money and sending it abroad or recruiting people on the ground and supporting them financially,” said Brian Michael Jenkins, a terrorism expert at the Rand Corp., a U.S.-based think tank. “We’ve seen this happen with returning fighters from previous conflicts.”
Europol, the European Union police agency, estimates that up to 40% of terrorist plots in Europe are at least partly financed through criminal activity.
“As regards returning foreign fighters, Europol believes that some returnees will perpetuate the terrorist threat to the EU through radicalizing, fundraising and facilitation activities,” said Jan Op Gen Oorth, a Europol spokesman.
Mr. Musto’s journey, reconstructed through statements by Bulgarian authorities, interviews with Bulgarian law-enforcement officials and lawyers involved in the case, and court documents that include prosecutors’ comments in court, allegedly took him from Syrian battlefields to an old train carriage in Sofia.
Born in Syria, Mr. Musto emigrated to Sofia in 2003 and several years later became a Bulgarian citizen, entitling him to live and work across the EU. Mr. Musto, who is 40 years old, became a father last year and lives with his partner in Sofia, according to court documents.
“For him, Bulgaria is home,” said Kiril Nikolov, one of Mr. Musto’s lawyers, who declined to answer detailed questions because the court case is ongoing.
In the summer of 2013, Mr. Musto joined Islamic State in Syria, according to court documents. The prosecutors’ statement said he took “active part in combat operations.”
During his arrest, police found what authorities said is a document from an Islamic State leader that allowed Mr. Musto unrestricted passage along the front line in Syria, according to court documents and the statement.
On his phone, police found what a law-enforcement official said were 10 videos of Mr. Musto in Syria sitting next to severed heads.
In 2016, Mr. Musto returned to Bulgaria and organized a group that bought, processed and distributed hookah tobacco without a license, according to the prosecutors’ statement. The statement also said that Mr. Musto had maintained ties “with the governing bodies and individuals of Islamic State.”
The tobacco business included Abdulkarim and Ivanka Sheho, a married couple who ran a hookah shop in Sofia called Dubai Pavilion, which was raided in September, according to court documents. The Shehos face charges related to the tobacco business but aren’t charged with terrorism-related offenses. The Shehos have pleaded not guilty, according to their lawyer, Nikolai Petroff.
On a recent visit, the shop was open, its shelves full of brightly colored hookah water pipes.
The tobacco was mixed and flavored in buckets in an old train carriage, which once housed a popular Sofia eatery, the Carriage Restaurant, according to the prosecutors’ statement. Up to 500 kilograms of hookah tobacco was sent each day to buyers in Germany, France and the Netherlands, according to the statement.
Mr. Musto became the leading figure in the business, according to the statement. “Practically this activity served as a front and a major source of funding for the group and especially for its leader,” according to the statement.
Through his lawyer, Mr. Musto says he was an employee of the Shehos and wasn’t aware that the business was operating without a license.
Ms. Sheho is currently under house arrest, according to court documents, and she declined to comment when visited in her apartment bloc on the outskirts of Sofia.
Mr. Petroff said that Abdulkarim Sheho had been convicted of unlicensed production and distribution of hookah tobacco twice before. After that, Mr. Sheho “took a step back from the business and Mr. Musto took his place, working with Mr. Sheho’s wife,” Mr. Petroff said.
Mr. Petroff said his clients weren’t aware of any links between Mr. Musto and Islamic State.
Mr. Musto sent profits to Islamic State through the hawala system, a centuries-old informal network for transferring money that is often used in international crime, according to law-enforcement officials. The system works through undocumented transactions across a large network of money brokers.
“The revenue from his business, much of which he was sending back to Syria, was substantial,” one of the officials said.
Source: WSJ
