In a document adopted during the November 23 vote, the European Parliament acknowledged that Russia has carried out “indiscriminate attacks on residential areas and civil infrastructure” in Ukraine, resulting in thousands of deaths. In the occupied territories, the Russian military carries out “executions without trial, kidnappings, sexual violence, torture and other atrocities,” the resolution said. Mass murders in Bucha, Irpen, Izyum, and Liman were also mentioned, as well as attacks on the Mariupol Theater and the Kramatorsk railway station.
The authors of the draft also noted that Russia violates the principles of the UN Charter, has caused a humanitarian crisis in Mariupol and destroyed 95% of the city, cut off Ukrainians’ access to gas, electricity, water and the Internet, as well as to basic goods and services.
“The European Parliament stresses that the targeted attacks and atrocities carried out by the Russian Federation against the civilian population of Ukraine, the destruction of civilian infrastructure and other serious violations of human rights and international humanitarian law constitute acts of terror against the Ukrainian population and are war crimes; expresses its unequivocal indignation and condemns these attacks and atrocities and other acts which Russia commits to achieve its destructive political goals in Ukraine and on the territory of other countries; in light of the above, recognizes Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism and a state that uses terrorist means,” the resolution reads.
In this regard, the European Parliament called on the European Union (EU) and its member states to develop a legal framework to define states as sponsors of terrorism and states that use the means of terrorism, which would entail a number of significant restrictive measures against these countries and would have profound restrictive implications for EU relations with these countries.
The European Parliament also calls on the EU Council to subsequently consider adding the Russian Federation to such a list of state sponsors of terrorism at the EU level, and for EU partners – to take similar measures.
In addition, the members of European Parliament (MEPs) called on the EU and its member states to take measures to initiate a comprehensive international isolation of Russia, including regarding Russia’s membership in international organizations and bodies such as the UN Security Council, and to refrain from holding any official events on the territory of the Russian Federation.
The European Parliament calls for further reduction of diplomatic relations with Russia and reduction of contacts with its official representatives at all levels to the absolute minimum necessary; calls on EU member states to close and ban Russian state institutions, such as the Russian Centers of Science and Culture, as well as organizations and associations of the Russian diaspora that operate under the aegis and guidance of Russian diplomatic missions and promote Russian state propaganda worldwide,” – the resolution says.
Once approved, the President of the European Parliament must send the resolution to the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, the Council of the EU, the European Commission, the governments and parliaments of member states, the UN Secretary General, the Council of Europe, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the International Criminal Court, to the President, the government and the parliament of the Russian Federation, to the president, government and parliament of Ukraine.
Also on November 21, the NATO Parliamentary Assembly recognized the Russian Federation and its regime as a terrorist state.
It should also be recalled that on October 13, 2022, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) unanimously adopted a resolution calling the Russian Federation a terrorist regime. PACE was the first international organization to recognize Russia as a terrorist state.
A number of European parliaments, including the Senate of Poland and the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic, decided to recognize the authorities of the Russian Federation as a terrorist regime.
Also, back in May of this year, members of the Lithuanian Seimas voted unanimously in favor of a resolution that recognizes Russia as a terrorist state.
In addition, on July 28, the U.S. Senate passed a resolution urging the State Department to recognize Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism because of the events in Chechnya, Georgia, Syria and Ukraine.
The text of the registered resolution states that “by order of President Putin, the government of the Russian Federation engaged in a campaign of terror, using brute force against civilians during the second Chechen war”. “Countless innocent men, women and children were killed or wounded as a result of the actions of the Russian government against civilian centers such as Grozny, the capital of Chechnya.”
Regarding the war in Syria, the text of the resolution mentions support for the Assad regime, which has been previously recognized as a sponsor of terrorism: “Since the Russian Federation entered the Syrian civil war in 2015, the Russian Federation has attacked innocent civilians, attacking them in civil markets, medical facilities and schools”, “The Russian Federation government has given material support to Syria, a country already recognized as a sponsor of terrorism, which has been used to attack the Syrian people”.
All these actions of Western countries against Russia are hypocrisy.
It is well known that the US and Western countries themselves were behind Russia’s invasion of Syria, and with Putin’s hands they suppressed the desire of the Syrian people to overthrow the tyrant and bloody dictator Bashar al-Assad, who had lost all legitimacy, the terrorist who kept his power through mercenaries and external forces. America itself is even more of a terrorist state than Russia, which brings dictators to power through artificial bloody revolutions and coups, then swap one unwanted tyrant for another through the same revolutions and coups. Somewhere it did this by direct and overt invasion, and somewhere it did it by foreign hands: by “saddling” another popular revolution, or by demanding the introduction of troops of another state, as it happened in Syria with Russia and Turkey, promising them something in exchange for their dirty “work”. America forced Russia into Syria by promising to turn a blind eye to the annexation of Crimea and seducing it with a share of the spoils from the colonization of Syria. Although, the annexation of Crimea could not have gone so smoothly without the approval of the United States. This explains the absence of any resistance on the part of Ukraine to this annexation. Crimea became a kind of bait, and then, after its “swallowing”, also a leash for US manipulation of Russia. America turned a blind eye to Russia’s crimes in Chechnya and Syria as long as it benefited it, in exchange for doing what America demanded of it and turning a blind eye to similar US crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan.
When Russia invaded Chechnya, the entire Western world remained silent, calling it “Russia’s internal affair,” or pretending to believe its false propaganda about “fighting terrorism,” “the bandit underground,” and “anti-terrorist special operations.” All this “international community” turned a blind eye to the atrocities of the Russian occupiers, to the carpet bombings, to the sweeps with kidnappings of people who were then found murdered and secretly buried, with traces of torture, bound and maimed. The same situation was in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation from 1979 to 1989.
And it was the same and even worse during the American occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq. The West kept silent about Russia’s crimes in Chechnya, while Russia “supported the fight against terrorism” of Western countries in Afghanistan, Iraq and beyond. But as soon as it came to Ukraine and the Ukrainians, suddenly all countries, with few exceptions, declared that they were against the occupation and bombing, and began to help Ukraine financially and with weapons. All world media began to call Putin the Führer and Russia the occupier, and to refute the lies of Russian propaganda about “special operations”, about “denazification”, “demilitarization”, “fighting the Nazis who seized power in Ukraine and the Banderaites”. But during the occupation of Chechnya, the same false rhetoric of Russian propaganda about the “anti-terrorist special operation” suited everyone.
The USA recognizing Russia as a terrorist state recognizes what was obvious before. Russia was a terrorist state even before the invasion of Syria, before the invasion of Chechnya, before the invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, and even before the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 to suppress an anti-Soviet uprising. Russia, while still the Kingdom of Moscow, has been a terrorist state since at least 1552 with the seizure of Kazan and the genocide of the peoples of the Kazan Khanate and their forced baptism. After them, other Muslim peoples were subjected to seizure, terror, genocide and forced baptism: the people of today’s Bashkortostan, residents of Astrakhan and Siberian khanates, the Caucasus, Turkestan, Crimea. The policy of terror and genocide of Muslim peoples and their occupation for the purpose of enslavement, forced conversion, russification, and assimilation, continued under Tsarist Russia, and then under the Russian Empire. After the revolution of 1917 and the communists’ ascent to power, the Soviet Union imposed atheism and the ideology of Communism on the Muslim peoples of Tatarstan, Bashkortostan, Siberia, Astrakhan, Crimea, Caucasus, and also continued the occupation of Turkestan, destroying mosques and Islamic books, killing imams and Islamic scholars, condemning Muslims to a slow death in the Gulag, and subjecting whole peoples to deportation and genocide. The fate of the Chechens and the Crimean Tatars is an example.
And today, Moscow continues and intensifies the terror of its own population, sending them to slaughter in Ukraine, suppressing anyone who opposes it. The terror of the Muslim population of Tatarstan, Bashkortostan, Crimea and the Caucasus also continues and intensifies, under the guise of fighting extremism and terrorism, by banning Islamic literature, murdering and imprisoning active Muslims who call for Islam for decades, falsely accusing them of extremism and terrorism.
This is the attitude of Russia and Western states toward Muslim peoples and their religion. Lies, hypocrisy, and double standards are the very essence of both Russian and Western culture and their values, which are hostile to Muslim peoples and alien to Islam.
The Messenger of Allah (SAW) said:
«سَيَأْتِي عَلَى النَّاسِ سَنَوَاتٌ خَدَّاعَاتُ يُصَدَّقُ فِيهَا الْكَاذِبُ وَيُكَذَّبُ فِيهَا الصَّادِقُ وَيُؤْتَمَنُ فِيهَا الْخَائِنُ وَيُخَوَّنُ فِيهَا الْأَمِينُ وَيَنْطِقُ فِيهَا الرُّوَيْبِضَةُ» قِيلَ: وَمَا الرُّوَيْبِضَةُ. قَالَ: «الرَّجُلُ التَّافِهُ فِي أَمْرِ الْعَامَّةِ»
“Truly, times will come for men when they will believe the liars and cease to believe the truthful; when they will trust the traitors and suspect in treason those who are trustworthy; and when the ruwaybid will have the word. He was asked, “And who are the Ruwaybida?” – and he answered, “Fools, who will speak of general affairs”.
Allah Almighty says in the Quran:
(وَإِذَا قِيلَ لَهُمْ لَا تُفْسِدُوا فِي الْأَرْضِ قَالُوا إِنَّمَا نَحْنُ مُصْلِحُونَ)
“When they are told, “Do not spread corruption in the land,” they reply, “We are only peace-makers!” [TMQ 2:11].
Shaikhetdin Abdullah