MOSCOW, March 10. /TASS/. Since the 1990s, Western intelligence agencies have used terrorism as a tool in the geopolitical struggle against Russia and controlled the activities of terrorist groups emerging in Russia, Alexander Bortnikov, Federal Security Service (FSB) director and chairman of the National Anti-Terorism Committee (NAC), said in an interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta on the 20th anniversary of the NAC’s establishment.
"The decision to create the National Anti-Terrorism Committee was influenced by the difficult events of the 1990s and early 2000s for Russian society as a whole. During that period, against the backdrop of a general crisis of statehood, a terrorist community was forming and consolidating, merging with organized cross-border crime," Bortnikov recalled.
"It became obvious that terrorist groups were controlled from abroad. This was carried out by the intelligence services of countries that hypocritically declared alliance with us," he noted. According to Bortnikov, terrorism had transformed into a tool of geopolitical struggle against Russia, undermining its sovereignty and territorial integrity, dividing and intimidating society, and provoking radicalism and extremism.
"The number and scale of terrorist attacks steadily increased. The number of victims also grew. Emissaries of international terrorist organizations, who possessed significant financial resources thanks to the support of anti-Russian foreign centers, recruited more and more supporters from among Russian citizens. The practice of sending foreign fighters and mercenaries into our country was escalating," Bortnikov recalled.
The NAC head compared the criminal underworld of that time to "a hydra, with several new heads growing in place of the severed ones." Twenty years ago, the terrorist threat became complex, and it was no longer possible to combat it solely by force. And "the monstrous terrorist attack in Beslan in 2004 became a kind of Rubicon." It was after this that the president decided to radically change his approach to anti-terrorist activities.
On March 10, 2006, a new collegial body — the National Anti-Terrorism Committee — and the Federal Operational Headquarters within it, was established by decree of the Russian president.
"Thus, the foundation was laid for the formation of a fundamentally new national counterterrorism system, simultaneously ensuring the development of coordinated measures at the federal, regional, and municipal levels, and also oriented toward close cooperation between the state and society," Bortnikov emphasized.