MAKHACHKALA, April 19. /TASS/. Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev has said that international terrorist emissaries continue to recruit North Caucasus youth.

"Although they suffered serious setbacks lately, the emissaries of international terrorist organizations have been pushing ahead with attempts to conduct recruitment activity," Patrushev said at a conference in Makhachkala. "Young people are number one target for the brainwashing attempts. So-called ‘individual jihad’ propaganda is underway. Alongside this the terrorists are looking for new likely routes of relocating to Russia their supporters who had obtained combat experience in Syria and Iraq," he added.

Patrushev briefed the conference on the detention of 452 terrorist and extremist suspects in the North Caucasus. He said 64 militants had been neutralized in the area, and 285 members of armed gangs had been brought to justice and 37 terrorist cells quashed.

"Propagandists of radical Islam involved in destructive and subversive activities have been exposed and 44 of them brought to justice on criminal charges," Patrushev said. More than 1,600 foreign nationals have been prevented from entering the North Caucasus Federal District illegally. About 3,500 foreign nationals, including some suspected of involvement in international terrorist and extremist organizations have been expelled from Russia. As a result of these and other measures the number of extremism-related crimes in the district reduced by 8% and terrorism-related crimes, from 17 to 8.

Patrushev urged further coordinated work along these lines, firm resistance to attempts by international terrorists to influence the situation in the North Caucasus and prevention of aggravations in the crime and migration situation.