Active

Terror organization: Uzbek Katibat al-Tawhid wal-Jihad (KTJ)

Status: Leader

Role: KTJ’s current leader and also one of al-Qaeda’s devoted followers. In April 2019, Abdul Aziz, an ethnic Uzbek of the Fergana Valley and former deputy emir of the al- Qaeda-linked Islamic Jihad Union (IJU) in Afghanistan, was elected the new leader of KTJ. According to a UN Security Council report dated 3 February 2022, “KTJ’s capability is undermined by conflict between the current group leader Abdul Aziz and the former group emir Abu Saloh.” But this is a superficial assessment of the situation taking place among the Uzbek jihadists in Syria.

It is noteworthy that Abu Saloh was removed from the leadership of KTJ under the pressure of HTS for openly supporting its strongest jihadi opponent, al-Qaeda-affiliated Hurras al-Din (HD), which directly challenged the leader of HTS Abu Mohammad al- Julani. It is also known that KTJ’s new leader Abdul Aziz swore bayat to al-Qaeda and the Taliban in the Afghan-Pakistan border zone as a member of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) in 2008. At that time, IMU became one of the strongest non-Arab al- Qaeda-linked groups in Central and South Asia. Abdul Aziz trained at the Haqqani Network’s military hub of Mir Ali in North Waziristan, which also hosted an al-Qaeda camp.

Location: Syria.

Also Known As: Abdul Aziz Domla, Abdul Aziz al-Uzbeki.