Prospect of Biological and Nuclear Terrorism in Central Asia and Russia. Musa Khan Jalalzai
cooperative measures and plannings of the extremist groups of Central Asia:
“Central Asian countries experience diverse intersecting influences: they feel changes in the situation in the Caucasus, in the Xinjiang autonomous territory of China, in Afghanistan and the Middle East. Militants from various terrorist groups in the region cooperate, many of them fighting in Syria and Iraq. But the biggest threat to Central Asia’s security is the situation in Afghanistan, where the Taliban provide organisational and logistics support to the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU). Despite sustaining a significant blow, with its main groups squeezed out of the region, it still maintains a presence in the form of underground groups that could become active at any time, joining forces with the radical Tajik opposition and Uyghur separatists. Cells of the Islamic State (ISIS) (a terrorist organisation banned in Russia) also operate in the region.........Tajikistan is a tension hotspot in Central Asia in terms of religious extremism and terrorism. A particular source of danger is neighbouring Afghanistan, where about 60 per cent of the lands along the frontier are engulfed in clashes between government forces and the Taliban and other radical Islamist groups. At the same time, there is almost no security along the Afghan-Tajik border, including the issue of drug trafficking”.15
Nuclear trafficking in South Asia and Europe was a key concern while the nuclear black marketing networks were uncovered in Libya to Syria, Malaysia and Afghanistan. Recent media reports identified Moldovan criminal groups that attempted to smuggle radioactive materials to Daesh (also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS) in 2015. Cases of nuclear smuggling in Central Asia were made recent cases. Muhammad Wajeeh, a Research Associate at Department of Development Studies, COMSATS Institute of Information Technology, Abbottabad Pakistan in his research paper (Nuclear Terrorism: A Potential Threat to World’s Peace and Security- JSSA Vol II, No. 2) has reviewed a consternating threat of nuclear terrorism in South and Central Asia:
“ISIS is believed to have about 90 pounds of low grade uranium (which was seized from Mosul University in Iraq are the invasion of the city in 2014) that can be used in the Dirty Bomb’s to create serious panic among the public. In 2015 and 2016, ISIS became the leading high profile jihadist group in Iraq and Syria. Moreover, ISIS carried out attacks in Paris on November 13, 2015, killing 130 civilians and injuring more than 100 people. The ISIS carried out a series of three coordinated suicide. Bombings in Belgium: one at Maalbeek Metro Station, Brussels and two at Brussels Airport in Zaventem, killing about 32 civilians and injuring 300 people. During the attacks, a G4S guard working on the Belgian nuclear research center was also murdered and it le the world believing that the ISIS has a potential plot to attack the nuclear facility either to steal the radioactive material for dirty bomb or to release the radioactive material and waste into the atmosphere. These attacks also raised the issue of nuclear security are a discovery made by the Belgian authorities that the ISIS has kept an eye on the local nuclear scientists and their families. Moreover, two Belgian nuclear power plant workers at Deol having knowledge of the nuclear sites joined ISIS and could provide assistance to exploit them for terrorist purposes. On March 30, al‐Furat, the media wing of ISIS, threatened attacks on Germany and Britain on the eve of Washington Nuclear Security Summit 2016”.16
The Prospect of Bioterrorism: The Threatof Pathogen, Biting Insects and DirtyBomb
In yesteryears, President Vladimir Putin’s resolve showed that he was feeling Russia as a great power. As President Putin elaborated in an interview with Oliver Stone, whether America’s motives are truly just centered on corporate welfare or not, the position the U.S. was putting him in requires him to respond to the heightened threat. Soon thereafter he claimed in his annual address to the Duma announced weapons of new generation the heavy MIRV (Multiple Independently Targetable Reentry Vehicle) missiles, one of which could kill every major city in Texas; nuclear-powered cruise missiles with essentially unlimited range for evading U.S. defenses; virtually undetectable nuclear torpedoes for destroying American coastal cities and major ports; and hypersonic delivery vehicles which completely skew the balance of Mutually Assured Destruction by reducing the amount of time that policy makers have to decide whether to go to nuclear war from 15 or 30 minutes to perhaps less than five.
Modern diplomacy (29 March 2020) in its short comment noted frustration of the US army and Pentagon vis-a-vis emerging security threats and modern technologies: “The technological superiority of the United States armed forces is being challenged by new and evolving threats constantly being developed by potential adversaries. To counteract these challenges, the country’s Department of Defense (DoD) is expected to spend an estimated $481 billion between 2018 and 2024 to identify and develop new technologies for advanced weapon systems, giving rise to numerous revenue opportunities in this space”.1 Before this, in February 2018, BBC reported Moscow’s condemnation of US military proposals to develop new, smaller atomic bombs mainly to deter any Russian use of nuclear weapons. Russia’s Foreign Minister called the move confrontational” and expressed deep disappointment”.2The proposals emerged from concerns that Russia might see current US nuclear weapons as too big to be used. The Russian Foreign Ministry accused the US of warmongering in its statement, issued less than 24 hours after the US proposals were published.
The recent coronavirus attacks authenticate my postulation of the intensification of bioterrorism in Europe and Asia in 2020. The blame game between Washington and China further prompted misunderstanding about the hegemonic role of the US army that it wants to mitigate the future role of nuclear weapons and missile technology in peace and war. Chinese Ambassador was summoned in Washington when Foreign Ministry in Beijing tweeted that the deadly coronavirus was seeded in Wuhan by the US military. US President Donald Trump also called Covid-19 a “Chinese” and “foreign” virus, earning condemnations not only from Beijing but also from much of the mainstream media. However, China categorically stated that the corono virus attack was a hybrid war against its economy and industry. Moreover, initially, Iranian officials also declared that the coronavirus was a biological weapon created in US military laboratories. Some state in Europe demonstrated weakness in fighting the Coronavirus war against their population.
Italy, Spain and France have been irritated in overcoming the death rate from the disease, while the British Prime Minister become frustrated in changing his controversial approach to the pandemic spread across the country. On 22 March 2020, the Guardian newspaper reported frustration of Downing Street about the shameless statement of controversial advisor to the Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Dominic Mckenzie Cummings, who argued in a private meeting that the government’s strategy towards the coronavirus was “herd immunity, protect the economy and if some pensioners die”. Now the Johnson administration decided to kill all British citizens in 60s and 70s. The allegations, which were widely circulated online widely criticised that the government response to the Coronavirus was initially too weak, frustrated and controversial based on a notion that rather than limiting its spread, enough people could be allowed to contract it to give population-wide “herd immunity”.3 Dominic Mckenzie Cummings acted like Afghan war criminal by proposing the killing of senior citizens.
On 03 April, 2020, Associate Professor in Practice at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore and the author of “The Billionaire Raj”, James Crabtree, in his Foreign Policy analysis painted an interesting picture of the ideas and perceptions of Brexit architect and Prime Minister Boris Johson’s political advisor, Dominic Mckenzie Cummings who is famous for his controversial thinking against the old population of his country that by saving economy, elderly lives must be sacrificed:
“More radical still were the ideas of Dominic Cummings, a Brexit architect and Johnson’s quixotic political advisor, to shake up the British state. Cummings attracted derision with a job advert inviting “weirdos and misfits with odd skills” to apply to join his Downing Street team. He planned to lead a group of self-styled insurgents at the heart of government, launching bold forays to scrap some state bodies and build others in their place, for instance a U.K. version of the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is responsible