CONTEMPORARY EURASIA VOLUME VI (1) Contemporary-Eurasia-VI-1-engl | Page 101

CONTEMPORARY EURASIA VI (1)
that the funding goes from the Islamic State itself, it becomes clear
that the whole activities carried out under this funding are
exceptionally aimed at recruiting and luring more and more
perspective young fighters to their ranks. If so, by funding
construction of mosques or Arabic language lessons, the ISIS leaders
not only assure successful recruitment process here, but also secure
that the new members of the organization are well educated in the
religious sense.
While talking about the mosques and propaganda, one name should
not be escaped mentioning - Aiuf Borchashvili – an imam in the
village of Jokolo of Pankisi region. He, using his privileges as the
imam, was helping young men from Pankisi to join fight in Syria and
then was sentenced to 14 years for this in 2015 30 .
Today, the region of Pankisi Gorge is still serving as a platform for
ISIS to recruit new young and fresh forces and minds. However,
Georgian Government is today taking steps in order to at least lessen
the numbers of its citizens that fight for ISIS, to not let more outflows
from its regions.
Steps against terrorism
Having such outflows of young Georgian citizens to terrorist
organizations could not but be a concern for the local government.
Latest two versions of National Security Strategy documents of
Georgia have always included special points that were dedicated to
underlining the importance of the issue of terrorism and of the fight
against it.
Issue of Terrorism In NSS documents of Georgia
The national security strategy documents of Georgia have tackled
the matter of terrorism many times. The last amendments of national
security document of Georgia were made in 2011, which explains why
these amendments did not cover the matter of threat from the Islamic
State and it's recruitment, however the document covers the matters of
regional security. And even though the importance of fight against
external forces in occupied territories is mentioned several times
30
Ibid.
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