Jund al-Khilafah (JaK) claimed responsibility for three terrorist attacks carried out by separate cells in Atyrau, Taraz and Almaty between October and December 2011. JaK caught Kazakhstani and foreign governments by surprise since the attacks, which targeted and killed state officials, were unprecedented in the country. However, a review of Kazakh jihadist activity since 2010 challenges the notion of JaK’s sudden emergence. Similar groups, which may even have included JaK members operating under a different name, released propaganda nearly identical to JaK before the fall of 2011.

BACKGROUND: In November 2010, a Kazakh group called Ansar Dine issued a call on the Caucasus Emirate’s hunafa.com, for Kazakhs to conduct hijra, or migration, to the Caucasus and Afghanistan, “assist the families of the mujahideen” and join the “global revolutionary jihad movement.” This was one of the first instances of Kazakh online jihadist propaganda, but it went largely unnoticed by governments and analysts concerned with Kazakhstan’s security since no attacks immediately followed or preceded it.

One year later, in November 2011, the Caucasus Emirate’s website Kavkaz Center released a video of 15 fighters in what appears to be Waziristan, Pakistan. Most of the fighters were identified in the subtitles as coming from Kazakhstan, while several other fighters came from Xinjiang, Turkey and Uzbekistan. A second video showed six fighters, including an “amir,” who said the fighters take part in military operations in Afghanistan, but that their “sphere of interest” is Central Asia, especially Kazakhstan. A second fighter said that after they achieve victory in Afghanistan their “goal” will be Central Asia. This group did not appear to have a distinct name, however, and given that it emerged after JaK was probably a different organization.

Jund al-Khilafah first released videos in September and October 2011 when it showed two attacks in which it claimed to have participated against U.S. forces in Khost, Afghanistan. In its third video on October 26, 2011, JaK threatened to “make a move” against the Kazakhstani government if it “insisted on its position” regarding laws forbidding prayer in public institutions and the wearing of headscarves, saying “that the policy that you [Nazarbayev] are following is the same that was applied in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt; however, as you have seen, it only caused loss to those who exercised it.” Five days later a JaK cell attempted to bomb government buildings in Atyrau.

JaK issued more statements in November following an attack in Taraz in which one of its members killed five police officers and in December after one of its cells responsible for police shootings was eliminated outside of Almaty. It also posted propaganda statements on the Ansar al-Mujahideen Islamic Forum condemning Nazarbayev's policies to close down mosques and saying that the name Jund al-Khilafa “reminds Muslims of their duty to revive the Islamic Caliphate as a system ... We believe that the region of Central Asia, in addition to the Islamic Maghreb [North Africa] and Yemen, are candidates to be the nucleus for the return of the Caliphate State in the future.” On December 18, JaK issued its last known video called “Overthrow the Tyrant,” saying “The massacre that happened in Zhanaozen where scores of the general public were killed appears to us that the regime of Nazarbayev doesn’t fight the mujahideen only, but rather he fights the whole Kazakh people.”

IMPLICATIONS: Even though JaK has not carried out attacks within Kazakhstan in 2012, the online propaganda continues, so the possibility cannot be discounted that JaK will continue to recruit from among the Salafi population in Kazakhstan and influence more people to carry out attacks. The government is responding in kind with increasing restrictions on the Internet, but this also shows the government’s concern about the effect of jihadist propaganda in the country.

The similar ideology in all statements from Kazakh jihadists suggests either that they are part of the same group but issue propaganda under different names, or that there are actually multiple Kazakh jihadist groups. The common thread among the statements is that the fighters all maintain that although they are based in Afghanistan for the time being, Kazakhstan is their main goal. However, they all support the creation of an Islamic Caliphate in Central Asia as a final goal and vow to destroy Nazarbayev’s secular regime and replace it with a government that imposes Sharia Law.

JaK claimed to have met with Mohammed Merah in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region before Merah carried out a series of killings of Jews and security officers in France in March 2012. This meeting has been corroborated by U.S. intelligence officials. JaK’s connection to the Merah attacks confirms that the group still exists and is not only seeking to recruit new members but is also willing to deploy new members not only to Kazakhstan but further abroad to Europe, probably in coordination with the Taliban, IMU and other militant groups in Waziristan.

In April and May 2012 a self-proclaimed representative of JaK responded to an online essay posted by an “Abu Jafar,” who called JaK a “gang of thieves” and accused JaK of “not troubling themselves with seeking (Islamic) knowledge” on the Caucasus Emirate’s Umma News and Kavkaz Center websites. The JaK representative said that JaK’s fighters are between 30-40 years of age in the Khorasan mountains (an ancient term for Afghanistan) and are training to “seek knowledge” of Islam. While this representative may or may not really be a member of JaK, the representative’s existence also confirms that either JaK supporters or JaK itself remain active.

Although Kazakhstan is the least religious country in Central Asia, Western Kazakhstan, where Atyrau is located and where JaK’s three founders originate, has an estimated population of 5,000 Salafists. Some Salafi groups have facilitated the travel of their compatriots who are willing to fight in Afghanistan by helping them obtain false travel documents, while other groups have collected and transferred money to Kazakh militants in Afghanistan. The Internet has helped these networks in Kazakhstan connect with their compatriots abroad, and has also been effective as a means of spreading propaganda to a country whose citizens are otherwise subjected to state-controlled media.

CONCLUSIONS: While ordinary citizens in Kazakhstan may not know about JaK and certainly all but a few extremists reject their ideology, this propaganda has effect. For example, some Kazakhs arrested fighting in the Caucasus claimed that they learned about the “war against Muslims” through online propaganda. At the least, these propaganda statements serve as a force multiplier to JaK’s attacks and put the jihad against the Kazakh government on the international stage. As a result the Kazakh government took new measures in 2011 to restrain online extremist activity. Access to approximately 150 extremist websites was blocked and 20 “cyber-crimes” were prosecuted in Kazakhstan in 2011. Meanwhile, 10,000 websites are being monitored in Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan is considering imposing more rules that will force internet cafes to monitor their customers’ use of the web. This is a catch-22 for Kazakhstan, for it cannot continue authoritarian measures against the freedom of expression which seem to legitimize JaK propaganda or risk having JaK and similar groups intoxicate minds with radical militant propaganda

AUTHOR’S BIO: Jacob Zenn holds a J.D. from Georgetown Law where he was a Global Law Scholar. He has extensive experience in Central Asia and Xinjiang, and he works as a legal adviser and international security analyst in Washington D.C. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ..