Countering right-wing extremism with sanctions

In this episode, Filip Brokes sits down with Hans Jacob Schindler, a renowned expert in the field of counter-terrorism and extremism. Hans provides an in-depth analysis of the growing threat of right-wing extremism, its financing mechanisms, and the international response to this rising danger. Drawing from his extensive career, including pivotal roles within the German government and the United Nations, Hans offers a unique perspective on how these extremist groups operate and what can be done to counter them.

Key Topics:

1. The Rise of Right-Wing Extremism:
   • Comparison of right-wing extremism with traditional religious terrorism.
   • The statistical growth and increased threat perception of right-wing extremist activities in Europe and the United States.
2. Financial Streams of Extremism:
   • Exploration of the seven main income streams of right-wing extremist groups, including donations, cryptocurrencies, music, combat sports, events, merchandise, real estate, and organized crime.
   • The role of these income streams in sustaining and expanding extremist networks.
3. Global Designations and Sanctions:
   • Recent designations of far-right groups as terrorist organizations by the U.S. and the European Union.
   • Discussion on why certain groups, such as the Nordic Resistance Movement and The Base, were designated and the implications of these actions.
4. Challenges in Countering Right-Wing Extremism:
   • The difficulties in disrupting right-wing extremist networks compared to Islamist terrorism.
   • The need for enhanced legal and regulatory frameworks to combat this evolving threat.
5. International Collaboration:
   • Insights into Hans’s work with the Counter Extremism Project, advising governments on developing legislation and strategies to combat extremism.
   • The importance of transatlantic cooperation in addressing the global rise of right-wing extremism.

Resources Mentioned:

• Counter Extremism Project (CEP): www.counterextremism.com
• Publications by CEP Germany: Accessible under the "Publications" section on the CEP website.
• Reports by Alexander Ritzmann: Search for his name to find detailed analyses on right-wing extremism financing.

Quotes:

• "Right-wing extremism is now considered a terrorism threat with much stronger transnational connectivity than it had about a decade ago."
• "The German government has now written a strategy where they say, this is about the financing and we will use all available means to disrupt these networks."

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Hashtags: #IntegrityInsights #Podcast #CounterTerrorism #RightWingExtremism #FinancialCrime #Sanctions #HansJacobSchindler #GlobalSecurity

This episode provides essential insights into the challenges of combating right-wing extremism in today’s world. Make sure to tune in and stay ahead of the curve in understanding this critical issue.

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Transcript

Hans, welcome on the podcast. Thank you so much for having me. Right. Let's start with a brief introduction and uh, I think you are actually out of all the guests that we have so far, you have probably the most extensive kind of academic and professional background, so let's try to. Uh, keep it brief, but, uh, I'm, I'm, I'm all ears.

Right. Okay. So just to do this very quickly, I'm currently the Senior Director of the Counter Extremism Project that is a transatlantic think tank that looks at all forms of extremism and terrorism. So from right wing extremism that we're gonna talk about today, all the way to Islamist extremism and anything in between, including left-wing extremism and one of the main.

Work streams that we have is really financial crime sanctions, evasion by terrorists, as well as just financing. Um, we have built up quite a work stream here in our office in Berlin where, um, right now, um, focusing on the financing of right-wing extremism, which will be, I think, the focus of our, of our discussion today.

Prior to this, um, well, starting in the late 1990s, I was an academic at SAR Andrews University focusing on international terrorism. Then joined the German government in April, 2001 as, uh, the elite analyst on Al-Qaeda in a place called Afghanistan, uh, Pakistan and Central Asia. Um, that became quite an interesting position, of course, six months later when there was the nine 11 attacks.

Um, I continued that work until 2005 Then. Was posted to Iran as, uh, the advisor to the, uh, German ambassador there, and the liaison to the Iranian security intelligence forces, uh, followed by me actually leaving the German government again after 10 years in 2011 when I came back from Iran. Um, then joined the private sector as a sanctions advisor fondly on, on, of course.

Counterterrorism financing, but also, uh, sanctions, uh, and Iran sanctions, uh, combating evasion. Um, until I got an email from the German foreign Ministry calling me back and said, you know, you would, you like to go to New York to serve in the security council? It was the first time really that Germany had a position available or the ability to suggest to security council to get a German elected.

That is hence the, the United Nation Security Council. Yes, that's the United Nation Security Council. Yes. Um, uh, a position available, what's called the Isla Ka Taliban Monitoring Team. Right. It's the advisors to the, uh, United Nation Security Council on those groups, but more crucially on the development of the global sanctions regime start, the security council, uh, maintains against those groups.

So technical questions from. Passenger data to financial transactions, monitoring to regulations of the arts and anti markets is what I did for five years, two and a half of which I was the coordinator, either head of the team until 2018. Then after five years, my mandate simply automatically ended and I had to leave the United Nations and joined the.

Counter extremism project and now I do the counter extremism project and sit on the board of a couple of research institutes and, uh, companies all focused on financial crime and sanctions. And the Country extremism project is, uh, is based, if I understand it correctly, in New York and in Berlin. Yes. And you kind of split your time between the two cities or how, how, where do you your time?

The two physical offices are, one in New York and one in Berlin. Um, we operate trans-Atlantic, uh, which means the main office New York. But then we have people in Washington. We have people in Brussels, in London, in uh, France, uh, in Munich. We have a couple of people newly we have. People in Poland, uh, and I simply go back and forth between the two offices, a couple of, uh, uh, weeks here in Berlin, a couple of weeks in New York.

So you are not just responsible for the Germany chapter. You also kind of, you are responsible for the global operations as well. Yes. I'm leading the entire organization as far as the content is concerned. So I strategic directions, uh, projects that we do with government. One thing that CEP does, uh, is really support governments in the development of legislation and regulation, uh, on, on quite a few fields, but the one.

Feel that is relevant today is of course, counter extremism, counterterrorism financing. So I'm also, uh, heavily involved in negotiating with various governments, uh, various projects. Mm-hmm. That's, that's, that's fascinating. And it's, and it's really great. I'm really grateful that you made the time for us to talk about extremism and the specific topic that I.

Wanted to talk about today was the, the recent, uh, recent designations of far-right groups as terrorist organizations in both the European Union and the United States. Um, and when we talk very, very broadly, like very broad question, uh, at the moment, how would you, I mean, you have spent so much time in this field looking at, uh, religious motivated extremism and now this far extremism coming more and more right-wing extremism coming more and more into the picture.

Like how big. The right wing extremism threat is compared to the traditional religious, uh, motivated extremism. See that's the problem when we are talking about big or not big vivi, speaking about statistics, right? So if you're talking about the statistics, how many in Germany are considered part of that milieu by the German intelligence security forces?

That's, uh, several 10,000 actually more than are considered to be part of the hardcore Islamist terrorist milieu in Germany. Way more, right? If you're talking about, um, how many crimes are committed by extremist phenomena. Right-wing extremism leads the field for a long time. However, of course, if you're talking about what is the individual threat perception, what is really scaring people, it's of course Islamist terrorism because they do few attacks, but those, they do are really spectacular.

If you think about what happened in Moscow in, in March, right? 140 people did the fact that we do have nearly daily attack. Uh, motivated by right-wing extremists in Germany simply is not in the public's mind as much because they don't have this fantastically spectacular terror operations. But they do a lot of, uh, lower level attacks and that's the reason really why since 2019.

So not just this government, but also the previous government, which as you remember, had the Bavarian CSU, um, minister of Interior, who has certainly not being accused of being too liberal. Even. He, um, said that the most sustained and gravest threat to the domestic security of Germany is currently right, right-wing extremism, not Islamist.

Terrorism remains a threat, but remains more or less a stable threat. While right-wing extremism has been grown fairly exponentially in the last couple of years. Which is, um, I suppose also the reason why earlier this year the US Department of State designated, um, an organization called Nordic Resistance Movement as, uh, a specially designated global terrorists.

And only a month later, the European Union, for the first time ever included a far right entity. The base organization called the base on its list of terror. Terrorist entities. Um, is there a, a reason for this timing, for this vertical timing, why these things are happening now? Well, I mean, first of all, there is a, a problem with designation of terrorism.

So while all the laws in the United States at the level of the European Union are not saying anything about Islamist terrorism, and they define terrorism, and when they define. What groups would be eligible to be included in these counterterrorism lists? Um, if you read through it, it's really been formulated with Al-Qaeda in mind, right?

And so it has to be hierarchical, it has to have a clear command and controlled structure. It has to have a clear threat to the US homeland, but must not involve us individuals in the leadership of that hierarchy. Yada, yada, yada. Same thing the other way around for the European Union. So we are now, however, facing a slightly different structured threat here because the one difference between Islamist terrorist groups like the Islamic State or Al-Qaeda Hamma or Hezbollah and right-wing extremism is that we are talking by and large of a leaderless.

Movement that, you know, orders itself into networks who do not necessarily have a clear command and control structure. And who, apart from individual perpetrators, who write these ridiculous manifestos all the time, um, these groups never take responsibility for any of the. This is the explanation why so few groups are, uh, designated.

Um, it is a little bit, in my opinion, embarrassing for the Europeans that the Americans have already designated two groups. And really you should see this as a, um, the, the latest de Nordic resistance movement as a extension of the early designation. So the very, very first designation of a right-wing extremist group in the United States as a globally.

Designated terror organization was the rational period movement, ironically, under the Trump administration, uh, because the Russian Imperial movement had trained some Scandinavians in Petersburg, who then went back to Sweden and bombed a whole bunch of migration centers in 2015 and 16, then got convicted.

Right. And so you had like a clear hierarchical, the Nordic, uh, the, the Russian appeal Movement is super hierarchical. It had. Held a training camp, right? It organized terrorists, um, sent them to a foreign country and they bombed stuff. So that really was like one-on-one Al-Qaeda in the, in the late 1990s.

So it seemed to be easier Now, however, those individuals used to be. Uh, before they became convicted members of the Nordic Resistance Movement, obviously the Nordic Resistance Movement immediately disavowed them, said, oh, their four members has nothing to do with us, yada, yada, yada. And that designation now by the US Government of the Nordic Resistance Movement, also as a terrorist organization, really indicates that they simply don't believe this disavowment, these guys, and I don't believe this disadvantage.

So this would be good ideas, uh, for the European Union. To designate both the Russian Imperial movement as well as the Nordic resistance Movement, but they haven't, they chose the base at the moment, a purely online movement that is doing propaganda. Not many operations at this point, so. I'm not quite sure why, you know, the base was the first one that they could all agree on.

Um, the, I, as I said, Nordic Resistance Movement, um, hammer skins, um, at Division Foer, Greeks division, there are many, many networks that I would think, uh, would have been far easier, far more obvious to designate rather than the base. But that's where we are. So the Americans designated the Russian and the European group, and we designated the American group.

Um, the leader of the base actually is, is now housed in Moscow. Um, but it is actually an American online phenomena, not necessarily with a, a big base now small BA big base in Europe. And it's, and it's, and it's, so it's basically, it should be understood more as a anti-Russian sanctions as opposed to. Far out extremism, sanctions.

No. I mean, you do remember the attitude of Donald Trump towards, uh, uh, president Vladimir Putin under his, when he was president. So, um, certainly it wasn't the intention to do it anti Russia, but certainly it was a clear signal from OFAC and the State Department that right wing extremism is now also considered terrorism.

I mean, these were bomb attacks, uh, that these individuals did in Sweden was not something low level or, or, you know, undangerous. And I mean, you already mentioned this, European designations, uh, the group, the base. Uh, do you have any kind of insights? I mean, you said that you don't really understand why they chose this organization, which is US Links and the, the leaders based in Moscow.

Um, but how do you, you know, how do you interpret this, you know, this decision suddenly also just one month made just one, uh, one, uh, month after. The US uh, designation. Yeah, but I don't think the, the, the base designation has anything to do with the US designations. I do know that there were several groups that were discussed and, uh, of course the legal advice, um, from the commission was that the base fulfills all the criteria.

Now what. The detailed arguments of the legal department of the European Commission is, I don't know. I haven't seen the document, so, but I know that they had several groups under consideration, and the base is the first one they said. They said yes, so don't let me, let me make clear, I don't wanna knock that designation.

Right. So first of all. Um, there is only just about over 40 individuals and groups at the European Union outside Iceland. Al-Qaeda has listed as terrorists, right? So there is the Ice Al-Qaeda list of the eu, which is. At the moment, still 100 or nearly 100% the United Nation Security Council sanctions list.

And then they have developed a separate regime, um, for Al-Qaeda and is l that the EU now can designate their own individuals and a handful has already. Been on that list. And then the rest are just really strange groups. Uh, some communist party in Southeast Asia that no one remembers why they were on that list ever.

Um, but then also Hama, pah, and then the important groups. So it's not there, it is not like the US list where you have hundreds and thousands of individuals in groups. You have a handful. And now designating a right wing extremist network is a very. Very important sign that the European Union finally has begun.

Seeing this for what it is, it is not an individualized domestic nuisance. It is actually a developing terrorism threat with much stronger transnational connectivity than it had about a decade ago based on, you know, new narratives like the Great Replacements theory, uh, white genocide and others that allow these groups who really hated each other in the 1990s.

Right. Set the polls and the Germans say, okay, for the time being right, I still hate foreigners and. Potentially hate you, but we are both white and now we need to fight together against the brown, the people and the migrants and people of color and anything that is bad on our society, which means globalization, L-B-G-T-Q, um, all of these issues that constantly come up.

And there's now a common enemy, which includes those foreigners in inverted commas, but also, you know, compatriots. So Germans were liberal politicians. Our or pro, pro migrant, uh, uh, politicians are now target. And we had a German politician from the conservative party being executed, uh, right a couple of years ago here in Germany because, um, he was working diligently to house migrants that were part of this big migrant wave, uh, from 2015 onwards.

So, Hans, if you are saying that the. The European thirties and also the thirties in the US are recognizing more and more this threat. And in the light of these two recent designations, do you, do you expect, uh, do you expect way more of these designations to come and come? Oh, absolutely. I mean, my organization, I, myself, others, uh, lobbying very hard on both sides of the Atlantic to say, okay, this is a very good beginning.

A beginning. So we really do need to, uh, make sure, um, that we continue to set these markers right. It's not gonna be possible to ever list all of the networks and groups that conduct violence and are right-wing extremist, uh, you know, motivated by right-wing extremists or anti-Semitic narratives. Um, but, uh, at least, uh, as the German government does very diligently on its domestic.

Panning lists of organizations where every couple of months, the next network, the next right-wing extremist group, uh, is banned Now a right-wing extremist key journal contact compact was banned, right? This is important to keep the scene, the milieu on it, toes to drive it ahead of you, to force it constantly to reorganize, occur operational costs, disrupt.

They're financing, right? So finally, the German government in its, uh, strategy last year and its update this year, uh, against right-wing extremism clearly says, uh, financing is one of the, you know, top priorities of what we are gonna do, uh, going forward, fighting this phenomena. And we want to, uh, uh, you know, disrupt those networks that generate those financing.

So it's a real, real emphasis, but in order to enable all of the instruments that we already have. IE counterterrorism financing instruments rather than, uh, you know, having to look at other elements. And we at CP have actually developed a strategy. What administrative, you know, tools, uh, or tax evasion tools could be used to disrupt financing if you don't have the counterterrorism financing tools at your hand, right?

Um, in order to avoid having to do just that. But use all of the, also developed private sector defensive systems against counterterrorism financing. You need to declare this as terrorism and ideally at the European level to have an equal implementation across the entire union and the, the sanctions as they are now.

How do they actually affect. Uh, these organizations, uh, when they are, when they, once they get designated, well, look, I mean, if you just have the base on the list, nothing really happens. This is a more or less political signal, obviously, that, uh, that's the hope. Uh, well, uh, um, also now, first time raise awareness within the right, within the financial industry.

Uh, within virtual asset service providers within other designated entities, uh, reporting entities, um, that this is now a phenomenon on par with other terrorist phenomenon. And you better start reading up on this and begin to understand how this works because there will be more down the pipeline. That's number one.

Number two, of course, anyone related to the base, um, wanting to do financial transactions, hopefully. We'll have a little bit of a harder time now in Europe, but it is, it's the beginning of a long road. We are not there yet, uh, compared to Islamist terrorism. And when we talk about the financing, uh, what, what are the, the main, uh, when you look at kind of like across the field of the far right extremist groups, what are the main, uh, ways they, these organizations get financed or raise funds?

Well, I mean, I, I am really proud to say that the, the Counter Extremism project actually with some help from someone, you know, um, were, were really the first organization, um, to really systematically analyze the financial income streams of right wing extremism. I think first time in, in Europe and North America for sure.

But beyond that, I'm sure as well, um, this is really. Seven income streams. So make, let me make sure that I don't forget. One first one is the traditional one and until just a couple of years ago, that was considered to be the main, if not the only income stream. That's basically donations and self financing.

Right. And, and in that respect, we also have. At least as far as Europe is concerned, uh, virtual asset cryptocurrencies really playing a role here, right in the collection of donations. The second income stream is anything to do with music. Uh, the biggest right wing extreme is music scene worldwide, actually happens to be in Germany.

So big industry companies who produce music manage bands, sell that music online and offline, right? Offline at events, but also online in their. Online shops then combat sports from gyms to managing teams, uh, and anything connected with that is an income stream. Then we do have the whole event space concerts, um, but also, uh, uh, uh, combat sports tournaments, sometimes integrated lots, hundreds of small concerts a year.

And a couple of really big, uh, uh, international concerts where everyone comes together. Then you have the income stream from sale of merchandise that goes beyond the music. You can now buy your protein powder from your neighborhood Nazi online if you like. So, um, but you can also buy literature and you can, you know, your crossbar and your knife.

To knife down your next migrant that you meet. All of this is readily available and really tragically readily available still on the global platforms because what these guys have learned is the easiest thing to get around your moderation rules of your Facebook or your Instagram or. Your YouTube, where you wanna sell that stuff is simply to present a top layer of really nice pictures.

No hate, no CrossBoss, no Hitler paraphernalia, just really smiling people wearing t-shirts, obviously hateful stuff on the t-shirts, but from kids to women's, you know, in in Wonderful pretty colors. You just an online store that sells t-shirts, right? So please don't look at what says on the t-shirts, but which is selling t-shirts very differently from a couple of years ago.

And then there's a link. And when you click on that link, you get to the second actual layer of the store. And there you got the whole thing. You've got your right wing extremist literature, you've got your knives and your cross balls and your steel helmets. You know what the hearts contend for? Any fascist, uh, what they need, right?

So that's the online and offline store, uh, thing. This has led to so much profits, um, that we have seen now investments in real estate, sometimes investments in real estate, simply to park some money. Other times investments in real estate, really to make a profit, right? We've seen some, uh, American militia buying real estate in African American neighborhoods in Chicago.

Really? I mean, there, this is not a DEI, uh, uh, uh, operation here of this right wing extremist militia, right? Um, diversity inclusion, and uh, uh, uh, project. This is really an investment because they know this is a gentrifying area in the city, and they will be able to sell this. Uh, uh, you know, a couple of years ago with a, with the hefty profit, and here in Germany in particular, we've seen investment in real estate also to generate, uh, what they call safe spaces, right?

IE if you have an event and you have it in your private house or in your private castle, it's much harder to actually ban the event from going ahead. Um, we have seen here in eastern Germany a couple of real estate projects where they're attempting to buy every single parcel of land in a village to create this kind of white village.

Right. Um, and then finally, of course, real estate is always a wonderful thing. Uh, to, to launder money because who knows what the real worth of real estate is, and it depends on what you write on your invoice, right? So that, that leads me to the last income stream, which is, um, you know, involvement in organized crime we had here to, to Ronan.

Um, being now after 36 times being convicted between nine individuals over the last couple of years for violent crimes now for the first time being convicted as a drug distribution network. So there is a great overlap. Between parts of the right-wing extremism, milieu, and the organized crime milieu, in particular out outlaw motorcycle gangs, right?

Common membership, common recruitment, um, uh, cooperation when it comes to the transport and distribution of illegal drugs or weapons, and that's really is the final income stream and the easier one to attack. If you understand that this is not a small truck ring, but it's a small truck ring that earns money for right-wing extremist causes and activists and for their operations.

And, and when we, when we stick to the German example, which I imagine given that you, you have done so much work, uh, in Germany, you have most experience with. How has the law enforcement, uh, kind of reacted to these findings? Have you seen some, uh, have you seen some particle measures that, uh. Uh, tackled those, those, uh, financing streams.

Yeah, look, I mean they, they're slowly catching onto the idea that there is more that you can do than, uh, to convict them just for the violence they're meeting out, right? So there is a tax investigations against a really famous rightwing extremists in East Germany right now, um, who had run a couple of restaurants and stores and there is now simply a.

Tax evasion investigation against him. Uh, then of course the German federal government has now written a strategy where they say, this is about the financing, and we will lose. We will use all available means, whether it's taxes or regulations, violation. Or any other, um, uh, opportunity that we get to disrupt that network there.

So at the moment, everyone is still grappling with this situation. The understanding is growing, that this is serious and that this is a growing threat, but we are nowhere near the level of investigative sophistication that we have on the Islamist terrorist side. And, uh, last question, Hans, you, you mentioned, uh, some of the work that you did, uh, with, uh, the Country Extremism project.

And I, I know that, I know myself that you have done a lot of fantastic research. There's a lot of reports when, for anyone who is interested, where can, where can people find, uh, uh, this, uh, this, this material? And is it available like for anyone? Yes. So I mean, apart from the actual lists with the names and addresses, uh, um, or the details of the counter strategy that we are suggesting to the various governments, everything else is online.

So the analysis of how the financing works, um, where the weaknesses in the financing are, are all available on our website, www dot. Counter extremism.com, and then you choose CP Germany. And then under publications, you get all of these reports, most of which are, um, in, uh, German and English. Um, um, only very few are just in German.

Um, but the, the basic ones are all in, in English as well. Um, you can find it there. My colleague Alexander Ritzman has done fantastic work. Uh, in this work stream over the last couple of years. So if you Google his name, Alexander Ritzman, you'll also get to those reports. It's maybe even the easier route to get there.

Fantastic. And I can really highly recommend, uh, I read many of those reports myself. And yeah, for anyone who is interested in the subject, it's a, it's a great read. Um, Hans, thank you very much for taking the time. Uh, it's been, it's been a pleasure and, uh, yeah, it's very, very relevant, timely, timeless subject.

So thank you for, uh, joining me today. Thank you so much for having me Anytime again.