The Islamic State-Khorasan Province (IS-K), an affiliate of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist group, is reportedly ramping up its media outreach in Central Asia.  The group’s propaganda efforts are raising concerns about the possibility of a terror attack in the region.

An article by Lucas Webber, posted on Eurasianet’s website, says the Moscow terrorist tragedy opened eyes around the globe to the seriousness of the trans-national threat posed by IS-K.  The assault reportedly also marked IS-K’s third successful external operation within a span of less than three months, following the suicide bombing in Kerman, Iran, and the church shooting in Istanbul, Turkiye.

The article notes that several other plots were foiled across Eurasia during the same time span, along with the takedown of an alleged IS-linked network in June with operatives in New York City, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia.  Many of those connected in recent years to an IS-K attack or foiled plot are Central Asian nationals, with Tajiks featuring most prominently.  Yet, despite the prominence of Central Asian citizens in IS-K operations, little attention has been given to the growing threat to Central Asia itself, according to the article.

Over the last few months, reports of an increasing number of IS-K-related arrests point to the group’s growth in Central Asia.  In late December 2023, for example, two teenagers were arrested after special forces disrupted an alleged plot targeting multiple locations in the southern Kyrgyz city of Jalal-Abad.  A few months later, a car bombing incident in Tajikistan’s Kulob region was deemed a terrorist act linked to IS-K.

In mid-June, Kyrgyzstan’s State Committee for National Security (GKNB) detained 15 individuals in Bishkek and elsewhere alleged to have IS-K connections, retrieving a “large quantity of literature.”  The suspects are accused of posting videos online that provide tactical advice on the use of weapons and explosives.  These arrests took place around the time that Kazakhstan busted a female cell said to be planning to attack a Western target, though authorities refuted the reports.

These incidents reportedly signal a troubling extension of IS-K’s regional influence, building on its pre-existing propaganda campaign tailored for Central Asian audiences.  In 2022, the group established official Tajik and Uzbek wings of its in-house Al-Azaim Foundation for Media Production.  Additionally, it now has a functioning Russian-language arm.  The Central Asia-facing campaign, which gained steam in 2020/2021, continues to find new means of conveying its messages, rolling out a new Tajik-language magazine shortly after the March 22 attack in Moscow.

Jihadism researcher Riccardo Valle noted to Eurasianet that IS-K is now “calling for similar actions to the Moscow attack.”  The group, in Valle’s view, is also adding nuance to messaging concerning the Tajik government, hoping to incite supporters to violence by exploiting hostile sentiments related to specific policies, such as Dushanbe’s recent hijab ban.

IS-K reportedly also seeks to score propaganda points by calling attention to Dushanbe’s and Tashkent’s close relations with Moscow.  Valle said IS-K is framing Uzbekistan as a Russian proxy and Tajikistan’s government as a “Russian puppet aiming to impose communism and eradicate Islam from the country.”

Central Asia has been fundamental to IS-K’s doctrinal shift in expanding its militant power projection, striving to position the group as the only vehicle available to disaffected extremists from the region capable of challenging entrenched governments. As part of its stepped-up outreach, IS-K has been engaging members of Jamaat Ansarullah, the Turkistan Islamic Party, and others, casting itself as an alternative for radicals who, it argues, are being constrained by the Taliban, and not allowed to take the fight to Central Asia.

IS-K’s Central Asia campaign is starting to shift, complementing propaganda with more work to expand its regional support base, recruit members and fundraise.  Now that IS-K has reportedly developed the foundation of its Central Asia strategy and has successfully expanded its influence among radicals in the region, its propaganda machine is starting to move in ways consistent with the group’s previous external operations against Iran, Turkiye, and Russia.  The same pattern is becoming apparent in Central Asia, in which IS-K floods the information space with propaganda as a prelude to direct attacks.

Some Tajik experts believe that Tajikistan and other Central Asia’s nations should worry about the IS-K since its members can use the tactics of so-called sleeper cells, which will be formed with use of Internet, personal contacts, especially in migration, in communities and diasporas. 

IS-K group, or Daesh–Khorasan, is reportedly active in South Asia and Central Asia.  The group has been active in Afghanistan and its area of operations includes Pakistan, Tajikistan and India where they claimed attacks, as well as Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Bangladesh and China where individuals have pledged allegiance to it.  The IS-K and Taliban consider each other enemies.

The group was created in January 2015 by disaffected Taliban in eastern Afghanistan, although its membership includes individuals from various countries notably Pakistan, Bangladesh, India and Myanmar.  Its initial leaders, Hafiz Saeed Khan and Abdul Rauf Aliza, were killed by US forces in July 2016 and February 2015, respectively.  Subsequent leaders have also been killed; its leader Abdullah Orokzai was captured in April 2020 by Afghanistan's intelligence service.

IS-K has conducted numerous high-profile attacks against civilians mostly in Afghanistan and Pakistan.  In July 2018, IS-K bombings killed 149 in Mastung, Pakistan.  In May 2021, an IS-K bombing killed 90 in Kabul.  In August 2021, IS-K killed 13 American military personnel and at least 169 Afghans during the U.S. evacuation of Kabul, which marked the highest number of U.S. military deaths in an attack in Afghanistan since 2011. The Daesh terrorist group claimed responsibility for two explosions that killed nearly 100 people and wounded scores of others at a memorial for Iran's top anti-terror commander Lieutenant-General Qassem Soleimani in the southeastern Iranian city of Kerman on January 3 this year.  IS-K also claimed responsibility for the March 22 attack on the Crocus City Hall concert venue, in which at least 144 people were killed.