UNITED NATIONS, September 26. /TASS/. Terrorist groups operating in Afghanistan, including with support from foreign intelligence agencies, continue to be a threat to Central Asian countries, Russian Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations Anna Yevstigneyeva said on Tuesday.

According to Yevstigneyeva, security risks stemming from the activities of the Islamic State - Khorasan Province, an offshoot of the Islamic State extremist organization (IS, outlawed in Russia), are of special concern for the Russian side, since the group has grown stronger "over the years of Western intervention." "We see that terrorists are deliberately tilting the situation by staging terror attacks, imposing an atmosphere of fear and desperation, and calling for ‘sharpening knives against bad Muslims’ represented by the Taliban (outlawed in Russia)," she said at a United Nations Security Council meeting on Afghanistan.

She said that the risk of terrorist activities going "beyond Central Asian countries" is "quite real." She noted that the anti-terrorist efforts made by Afghanistan’s actual authorities are not enough. "This is a secret to no one, and militants themselves say this, that the Islamic State is being supported from the outside, including by foreign intelligence agencies. However, this is no surprise to us," she added.