International terrorists use channels of migration to penetrate Russia - FSB Director

(December, 12, Moscow, Sri Lanka Guardian) Russian intelligence agencies possesses information that migration is used by the international terrorists for crime activity in territory of the Russian Federation, according to Director of Federal Security Service (FSB) of the Russian Federation Nikolai Patrushev.

News agency Interfax cites Patrushev speaking today at a session of National Antiterrorism committee in Moscow that the committee has obtained information that „channels of migration are actively used by participants of international terrorist and extremist organizations for penetration territory of Russia with an aim of carrying out of crime activity and financing criminal underground”.

About 22 million of foreign citizens and persons without citizenship visit Russia every year, however, many of them stay illegally in territory of our country ", the FSB Director said. Patrusehv has noted that it is necessary to strengthen " the international antiterrorist partnership and a special coordinating role in this activity of the United Nations ", Interfax says.

More than 70 planned terrorist attacks, some of which would have involved suicide bombers, were prevented in the North Caucasus this year, Nikolai Patrushev, the head of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) said today at a meeting of the National Anti-Terrorism Committee, online paper Dni.ru reports.

Addressing the members of the committee, Russia's security chief said over 500 militants had been disarmed since the start of the year including 13 warlords, and that 150 militants had surrendered. He said 35 people were convicted of terrorism in 2007. Three were sentenced to life in jail for involvement in terrorist attacks in the Moscow metro in 2004 and a series of bus-stop blasts in the southwest Russian city of Voronezh and the southern city of Krasnodar in 2003-2004. The North Caucasus has been a volatile region since the demise of the Soviet Union, and although the Kremlin has broken the backbone of separatist forces in Chechnya, small militant groups are still active in the republic and adjacent areas, Dni.ru adds.

(Agencies)