Page 44 - Cyber Terrorism and Extremism as Threat to Critical Infrastructure Protection

SECTION I: EXTREMISM, RADICALIZATION AND CYBER THREATS AS AN IMPORTANT
SECURITY FACTORS FOR COUNTERING TERRORISM PROCESSES

Azinović and Jusić presented strategic objectives of Kosovo government and put pursuit as
one of the important factor. According to this Kosovo Government understand “pursuit, in-
vestigation and bringing to the justice individuals or groups who pose a terrorist threat or who
commit terrorist acts.
• Preventing, hindering and investigating violent extremists or terrorists from influencing, re-
cruiting, planning and building legitimacy within the territory of the Republic of Kosovo.
• Establishing partnership with the community, and inter-institutional, regional and interna-
tional cooperation and coordination, and of international organisations.
• Establishing and strengthening the capacities of the Institutions of the Republic of Kosovo
in identification, prevention, detection and pursuit (Azinović and Jusić, 2016, p 151)”.

Poverty, the war that finished not that long ago, and the mostly Muslim citizens were all pluses
for the Islamic State, which saw in this country potential fighters: “Nearly two decades after
the war, following the establishment of the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, many young people
from Kosovo, some of them taking their wives and children, joined ISIS and the al-Qaeda
branch, al-Nusra” (Haxhiaj and Nabolli, 2018, e-source). The Republic of Kosovo became,
in a short period of time, a source country for members of the Islamic State. Looking at the
figures, it is easily concluded that a large number of Kosovo citizens accepted the ideology of
the Islamic state and went to fight on the side of this organization. The number appears even
larger when we remember that Kosovo has only 2 million residents. Statistics confirm that
more than 315 people from Kosovo, 120 from Albania and over 100 from Macedonia have
joined the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq over the past few years. At least 65 of them were
killed in the fighting, leaving their families in an even worse plight (Haxhiaj and Nabolli,
2018, e-source). This information has been confirmed by the Government of Kosovo; about
300 Kosovo citizens have been involved in the conflicts in Syria and Iraq. Reacting to the rise
of foreign fighters, in 2015 the Government of Kosovo enacted a law that forbids any partici-
pation, financing, or recruitment in military conflicts outside the state territory.

According to official demographic data provided by the Kosovo police, “about 75 percent of
Kosovar nationals of adult age (men and women) known to have travelled to Syria and Iraq
after 2012 were born between 1984 and 1997. […] Police records indicate that of the 142
Kosovans for whom educational data is available, 3 percent have completed elementary edu-
cation, 87 percent secondary education, and 10 percent tertiary education. The overwhelming
majority of known foreign fighters from this dataset have moderate rather than poor formal
education, contrary to what anecdotal evidence sometimes indicates. Put differently, it is not
necessarily or primarily the less educated—and by implication more uninformed—segments
of society who are recruited to fight in Syria and Iraq (Shtuni, 2016, p 3).

What has happened to all these people? “As of May 2016 about fifty-seven Kosovan men,
some 18 percent of all nationals who have travelled to Syria and Iraq, are reported killed. No
deaths among women and children have been reported. As many as 117 people (37 percent)
have since returned to Kosovo. Returnees are overwhelmingly men; in other words, 45 percent
of all men who travelled to Syria and Iraq have since returned. By contrast, only one in seven
women, less than 14 percent, have returned to Kosovo. Given that most Kosovan women have
reportedly travelled to Syria and Iraq with their husbands, this trend may indicate that the men
who have travelled to the conflict theatre with their spouses are arguably more committed to
the cause and less likely to return home. At the same time, it is more difficult for women to
leave the conflict zone because they can travel only when accompanied by a man. When their

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