The publisher of the Kavkaz Center website is vowing to continue his work after being acquitted by a Finnish court on May 9 for illegally bringing Chechen asylum seekers into the country.
Finnish entrepreneur and activist Mikael Storsjo admitted to arranging plane tickets for Chechens to come to Finland, but a Helsinki court found he didn't do it for personal gain, therefore he committed no crime under local laws.
Storsjo serves as chairman of the Pro-Caucasus Society, which publishes the Kavkaz Center website, often used by insurgents to post news and commentary. Storsjo, who admits no editorial control over the site and claims to only provide web-hosting services, says he is the victim of a harassment campaign by the Kremlin.
Storsjo says that his house was broken into recently. He says he and his family have received death threats by members of the Finnish Anti-Fascist Committee as well as Russian and Estonian members of Nashi, a pro-Kremlin youth organization.
Critics charge Kavkaz Center with supporting terrorism. Members of the Finnish Anti-Fascist Committee claim that the Chechens Storsjo has brought to Finland are terrorists.
Storsjo counters that of the more than 70 asylum seekers he has helped bring in to Finland all but one, whose claim is still being processed, have been cleared by the Finnish government.
British journalist Phil Rees says that Kavkaz Center has complex political leanings: "They're certainly not terrorists I mean, absolutely, OK, no way, but there's this whole vague area of, if you support a cause, at what point does that support for the cause spill over, you know, to supporting people whose actions you may disapprove of?"
Storsjo acknowledges the website's leanings, but stresses he has no influence over the site's editorial policy. Kavkaz Center editors would not respond to a request for comment.
Continued on Page 47
The trial of the man believed to be behind a failed bombing attempt in Copenhagen last September is set to begin tomorrow.
Lors Doukaiev, a 25-year-old Belgian who lost a leg to a landmine at age nine on a playground in Grozny, Chechnya, is thought to have accidentally set off a bomb at Hotel Jørgensen last September.
The homemade bomb blew up accidentally in his hands, injuring only himself. The intended target of the bomb is uncertain, but investigators think he was preparing to send a letter bomb to the offices of Jyllands-Posten, which published Mohammed cartoons in 2005.
At first, Doukaiev was able to frustrate police efforts to determine his motive or his identity by refusing to speak. His identity was eventually corroborated by his Belgian boxing coach after reporters from BT newspaper began their own investigation.
It is now known that Doukaiev had been in Denmark twice before the failed bombing. His first visit was back in May 2008 when he came on an architectural study tour.
After the bomb exploded, Doukaiev is thought to have fled to the nearby Ørstedsparken, where he was later arrested.
At the time of the incident, a TV 2 film crew was recording a show about police dog patrols and the same dog patrols being accompanied by the crew were coincidentally those used to track down Doukaiev.
Although their TV cameras filmed Doukaiev handcuffed and face down in the gravel after being caught, they were prohibited to show it at the time since they had signed a contract only allowing their footage to be used for the specific program they were filming.
Continued on Page 47
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
