Islamic State Report on Insurgent Operations in Azerbaijan

Translation and Overview

Azerbaijan is a predominantly Shi‘i Muslim country and its government is secular in nature. However, some of the country’s Sunni minority did mobilise and go to fight in the Syrian civil war, including those who joined the Islamic State. Further, there are some within Azerbaijan who declare their allegiance to the Islamic State. The Islamic State itself has previously advertised the existence of affiliated fighters in Azerbaijan, featuring them giving allegiance to the group’s second caliph Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi in 2019, as can be seen below.

Now, in this week’s issue of the Islamic State newsletter al-Naba’, the group reports on fighting between Islamic State fighters and Azeri government forces in the north of the country. The report constitutes the first officially claimed operations of the group in Azerbaijan.

It should be noted that Azerbaijan is not officially listed in the propaganda publications as an Islamic State ‘province’ (wilaya), but it is possible that within internal administration it is treated as such, and the public announcement of an Azerbaijan ‘wilaya’ has not been made for security reasons.

Below is the report from al-Naba’ translated.