Disrupting Escalation Of Terror In Russia To Prevent - Belfer Center ...

FSB to declare a state of emergency in an area threatened by “terrorist danger” for up to sixty
days based on information—even if unverified—about preparations for a terrorist attack. 79
Law enforcement officials in the North Caucasus have extensively relied on the existing
laws in their efforts to fight terrorism, but they have also abused the powers given to them by
cracking down on dissent that has little to do with terrorism, as demonstrated below in the case
study of Dagestan. In Chechnya, law enforcement agencies have gone greatly exceeded their
authority in conducting extrajudicial executions during the shift away from large-scale
operations to seek-and-destroy patrols. 80
During the researched period, Russian authorities also gave the law enforcement and
defense agencies a silent nod on assassinations of suspected insurgency terrorist leaders both in
Russia and abroad. Additionally, while the Federal Security Service did not hesitate to assume
responsibility for killing warlord Khattab in Chechnya after he died of poisoning in April 2000,
no Russian agency would admit to having killed the vice president of Chechnya’s self-
proclaimed separatist government, Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev, in Qatar in February 2004. While
refusing to assume responsibility, Russian authorities demanded and succeeded in obtaining the
transfer of two Russian agents convicted of the assassination back to Russia under the order of a
Qatar court.
79 If passed into law, the bill will grant the security services the right to monitor private communications, ban
demonstrations and prevent the movement of people and vehicles in zones where a terrorist alert is declared. Under
the bill, the power to declare a state of emergency would reside with the head of the counterterrorism operations
headquarters, a ranking FSB officer appointed by the prime minister.
Under the existing law, a state of emergency can be called for the duration of a counterterrorism operation.
The bill does not specify how often a state of terrorist danger can be declared. The bill also sets out legal procedures
allowing the military to participate in counterterrorism operations—including, for the first time, those beyond
Russia’s borders—under the overall direction of the FSB, the country’s lead counterterrorism agency. The bill
would oblige journalists to cover terrorist attacks only within limits set by the FSB’s counterterrorism operations
headquarters. It was not clear from the bill whether all media outlets covering a terrorist attack, including those not
reporting from the scene, would need to obtain FSB permission, or whether the headquarters would have the
authority to block media coverage.
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