Norway to extradite jihadist Kurdish cleric to Italy

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Norway’s justice ministry on Wednesday greenlighted the extradition of a fundamentalist Kurdish cleric Mullah Krekar to Italy, where he has been sentenced to prison for leading a jihadist network.

Najumuddin Faraj Ahmad, more widely known as Mullah Krekar, was arrested in Norway in July 2019 after being convicted in absentia by an Italian court for leading Rawti Shax, a Europe-based Kurdish jihadist movement with alleged links to the Islamic State group (ISIS). The 63-year-old was sentenced to 12 years in prison. 

The Norwegian judiciary, including the Supreme Court, has authorised the extradition requested by the Italian authorities in July 2019 three times. Monica Mæland, Norway’s newly appointed justice minister, gave the extradition order its final authorization on Wednesday. 

"The ministry considers that the conditions for an extradition to Italy are met," Maeland said at a brief press conference.

European authorities orchestrated a crackdown on suspected Rawti Shax members back in 2015, arresting 15 Iraqi-Kurdish nationals on terrorism-related charges. Only Krekar and five others were charged, according to a lawyer of one of the defendants.

Dorbeen, an outlet closely affiliated with Krekar, reported that Zana Rahim Hamawandi - another of the six charged - is to be extradited from the UK to Italy. Neither a date for Hamawandi's extradition nor information on the fate of the remaining four charged was given by the site.

Krekar was granted refugee status in Norway  in 1991, after fleeing the Kurdistan Region with his family. He has been arrested and tried in court several times in Norway for issuing threats to the safety of several people - including Norwegian premiere Erna Solberg long before she became prime minister. Oslo tried to deport him as early as 2003, believing him to be a threat to national security.

Oslo saw Krekar as a threat to its national security but refused to return him to Kurdistan Region on the grounds that he could face the death penalty there.

Krekar was also the founding leader of the group that came to be known as Ansar al-Islam, which from 2001 controlled the mountainous area straddling the border between Iran and Iraq near Halabja. 

Jihadists fled to the Iran-Iraq border area after the US invaded Afghanistan, accusing the Taliban of harboring al-Qaeda in the country. The Iran-Iraq border area came to be nicknamed "little Tora Bora", after the Taliban stronghold in Afghanistan where al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden once sheltered. 

The group applied Sharia law, banning music and forcing men to grow their beards long. Those who violated the militants’ strict code were lashed in public. Members of the Kaka'i religious minority considered heretical by extremists were forced to convert to Islam or flee the enclave.

The US military demolished Ansar al-Islam strongholds in the area with airstrikes and Tomahawk cruise missiles during the 2003 war and dismantled the group’s network.

Krekar now has three weeks to file an appeal to Norway’s King in Council, a special cabinet meeting on matters of importance where the King attends. Krekar’s defense attorney Brynjar Meling says he will appeal to the International Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg to stop the extradition.

"There will be an appeal. I am already working on it," Brynjar Meling, Krekar's lawyer told AFP.

According to Meling, who is also considering taking the case to the European Court of Human Rights, there is no evidence indicating that his client was guilty.

"This is a sad day for the rule of law in Norway and for justice minister Monica Maeland. It is obviously a wrong decision," he added.

Additional reporting by AFP