Virginia
Afghan man sentenced to 20-year prison term in case tied to suicide bombing at Kabul airport
ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — An Islamic State group member was sentenced Wednesday to 20 years in prison for aiding the terrorist organization that took credit for a suicide bombing that killed 13 U.S. service members and about 160 Afghans at the Kabul airport five years ago during the American military’s chaotic withdrawal from the country.
A federal jury in Virginia had convicted Mohammad Sharifullah in April of providing material support to the IS affiliate known as ISIS-K. But jurors could not agree whether he bore some responsibility for the airport bombing on Aug. 26, 2021.
U.S. troops were conducting an evacuation operation at the airport when a lone suicide bomber detonated an improvised explosive device near an entry point known as Abbey Gate. Sharifullah’s role in the attack was scouting a route to Hamid Karzai International Airport, prosecutors said.
Sharifullah received the maximum sentence for his one-count conviction in an international terrorism case that President Donald Trump heralded last year during a speech to a joint session of Congress.
Sharifullah did not testify at his trial and declined to address the court before U.S. District Judge Anthony Trenga imposed the sentence. The judge said the defendant was a “dedicated terrorist” who expressed no remorse for the “unfathomable” grief and suffering that he had caused.
Trenga heard victim impact statements from several parents of U.S. service members. From a podium only a few feet from where Sharifullah sat, they took turns paying tribute to their children’s sacrifices and describing how the attack has shattered their families.
Sharifullah requested a 17-year prison sentence, while prosecutors sought 20 years. His lawyers say he was never an ISIS-K leader and has not been convicted of any conduct related to the airport suicide bombing.
“He was brought here because the government believed he participated in the Abbey Gate attack, a theory which it was unable to prove at trial,” defense attorneys wrote.
Prosecutors said in their sentencing memo that “from his teenage years, when he pledged an oath of allegiance to ISIS-K, Sharifullah’s carnage was driven by hate. Hate towards Americans.”
Jurors convicted Sharifullah of providing material support to ISIS-K. They deadlocked on whether any deaths at the airport “resulted from” that conspiracy. Sharifullah could have faced a possible life sentence if the jury had unanimously decided that question.
According to prosecutors, Sharifullah told a journalist that he wanted to “catch and kill the crusaders” from the United States for invading his country after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. They said Sharifullah was involved in dozens of other attacks, including a March 2024 assault on a Moscow concert hall that killed roughly 140 people.
Defense lawyers argued that prosecutors failed to present any evidence tying Sharifullah to the Kabul bombing besides his own words during hours of FBI questioning. His team said Sharifullah told FBI agents what he thought they wanted to hear, possibly because he was afraid of being tortured in Pakistani custody before he was brought to the U.S.
A review by U.S. Central Command found that the Abbey Gate bomber was Abdul Rahman al-Logari, an IS member who had been released from an Afghan prison by the Taliban. According to an FBI affidavit. Sharifullah recognized the alleged bomber as an operative he had known while incarcerated.
New York
The FBI thwarted a Russian plot to kill a prominent dissident in Washington, authorities say
NEW YORK (AP) — The intelligence services of the Russian Federation are plotting to carry out targeted killings in the U.S. and in European nations supporting Ukraine, federal authorities said Tuesday in announcing they’d thwarted a plot to kill a prominent Russian dissident believed to be living in Washington, D.C.
Five people assumed to be living abroad were charged in the plot, according to an indictment unsealed in Manhattan federal court. It said a network of the Russian intelligence services has paid and tried to pay individuals in the United States and in other countries since 2024 to surveil and then kill Russian dissidents.
The associates recruited by the network also have been solicited to carry out acts of terrorism against civilian and military infrastructure in European countries that are perceived to be aligned with Ukraine, the indictment said.
Darren B. Cox, head of the Washington, D.C., office of the FBI, in a release cited “extraordinary work by multiple FBI field offices, components, and partner agencies” and said they “moved quickly to disrupt the plot.”
According to the release, a network of people working for the Russian Federation’s intelligence services had since at least 2024 conspired to conduct and had conducted attacks and murders around the world, including within the United States.
Previously the network had focused on Russian dissidents and defectors but following Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine had targeted nations perceived to be allies of Ukraine, the release said. Recently, members of the network have tried to recruit multiple people in the United States, it said.
Among those charged in the indictment were three high-ranking members of the Russian intelligence services, authorities said. They were identified as Yuri Khrameev, a former colonel in the Russian intelligence services; his son, Kirill Khrameev, an officer in the Federal Security Service of Russia; and Oemis Romagoza Durruthy, a Cuban national and an influential member of the Cuban diaspora living in Russia.
The indictment said the Federal Security Service is Russia’s principal security agency and the successor agency to the former Soviet Union’s Committee for State Security, which was known as the KGB.
Yuri Khrameev and two others charged in the indictment — Yaidel Delgado Suarez and Angel Eduardo Castro, both living in Russia — recruited a Venezuelan citizen living in Brooklyn to surveil and murder a prominent Russian dissident they believed to be residing in Washington, D.C., the indictment said.
It said the Brooklyn resident was sent to two locations associated with the targeted victim and was given “explicit instructions on how to conduct surveillance” while being promised $1,000 and $1,500 to carry out the work.
After conducting the surveillance and providing multiple photographs and videos of locations associated with the intended victim, the U.S. resident turned down the $40,000 that was offered to “eliminate” or “disappear” the target through murder, authorities said.
When the offer was rejected, the member of the intelligence services who made it offered multiple other people within the United States substantial amounts of money to finish the job, the indictment said.
Afghan man sentenced to 20-year prison term in case tied to suicide bombing at Kabul airport
ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — An Islamic State group member was sentenced Wednesday to 20 years in prison for aiding the terrorist organization that took credit for a suicide bombing that killed 13 U.S. service members and about 160 Afghans at the Kabul airport five years ago during the American military’s chaotic withdrawal from the country.
A federal jury in Virginia had convicted Mohammad Sharifullah in April of providing material support to the IS affiliate known as ISIS-K. But jurors could not agree whether he bore some responsibility for the airport bombing on Aug. 26, 2021.
U.S. troops were conducting an evacuation operation at the airport when a lone suicide bomber detonated an improvised explosive device near an entry point known as Abbey Gate. Sharifullah’s role in the attack was scouting a route to Hamid Karzai International Airport, prosecutors said.
Sharifullah received the maximum sentence for his one-count conviction in an international terrorism case that President Donald Trump heralded last year during a speech to a joint session of Congress.
Sharifullah did not testify at his trial and declined to address the court before U.S. District Judge Anthony Trenga imposed the sentence. The judge said the defendant was a “dedicated terrorist” who expressed no remorse for the “unfathomable” grief and suffering that he had caused.
Trenga heard victim impact statements from several parents of U.S. service members. From a podium only a few feet from where Sharifullah sat, they took turns paying tribute to their children’s sacrifices and describing how the attack has shattered their families.
Sharifullah requested a 17-year prison sentence, while prosecutors sought 20 years. His lawyers say he was never an ISIS-K leader and has not been convicted of any conduct related to the airport suicide bombing.
“He was brought here because the government believed he participated in the Abbey Gate attack, a theory which it was unable to prove at trial,” defense attorneys wrote.
Prosecutors said in their sentencing memo that “from his teenage years, when he pledged an oath of allegiance to ISIS-K, Sharifullah’s carnage was driven by hate. Hate towards Americans.”
Jurors convicted Sharifullah of providing material support to ISIS-K. They deadlocked on whether any deaths at the airport “resulted from” that conspiracy. Sharifullah could have faced a possible life sentence if the jury had unanimously decided that question.
According to prosecutors, Sharifullah told a journalist that he wanted to “catch and kill the crusaders” from the United States for invading his country after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. They said Sharifullah was involved in dozens of other attacks, including a March 2024 assault on a Moscow concert hall that killed roughly 140 people.
Defense lawyers argued that prosecutors failed to present any evidence tying Sharifullah to the Kabul bombing besides his own words during hours of FBI questioning. His team said Sharifullah told FBI agents what he thought they wanted to hear, possibly because he was afraid of being tortured in Pakistani custody before he was brought to the U.S.
A review by U.S. Central Command found that the Abbey Gate bomber was Abdul Rahman al-Logari, an IS member who had been released from an Afghan prison by the Taliban. According to an FBI affidavit. Sharifullah recognized the alleged bomber as an operative he had known while incarcerated.
New York
The FBI thwarted a Russian plot to kill a prominent dissident in Washington, authorities say
NEW YORK (AP) — The intelligence services of the Russian Federation are plotting to carry out targeted killings in the U.S. and in European nations supporting Ukraine, federal authorities said Tuesday in announcing they’d thwarted a plot to kill a prominent Russian dissident believed to be living in Washington, D.C.
Five people assumed to be living abroad were charged in the plot, according to an indictment unsealed in Manhattan federal court. It said a network of the Russian intelligence services has paid and tried to pay individuals in the United States and in other countries since 2024 to surveil and then kill Russian dissidents.
The associates recruited by the network also have been solicited to carry out acts of terrorism against civilian and military infrastructure in European countries that are perceived to be aligned with Ukraine, the indictment said.
Darren B. Cox, head of the Washington, D.C., office of the FBI, in a release cited “extraordinary work by multiple FBI field offices, components, and partner agencies” and said they “moved quickly to disrupt the plot.”
According to the release, a network of people working for the Russian Federation’s intelligence services had since at least 2024 conspired to conduct and had conducted attacks and murders around the world, including within the United States.
Previously the network had focused on Russian dissidents and defectors but following Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine had targeted nations perceived to be allies of Ukraine, the release said. Recently, members of the network have tried to recruit multiple people in the United States, it said.
Among those charged in the indictment were three high-ranking members of the Russian intelligence services, authorities said. They were identified as Yuri Khrameev, a former colonel in the Russian intelligence services; his son, Kirill Khrameev, an officer in the Federal Security Service of Russia; and Oemis Romagoza Durruthy, a Cuban national and an influential member of the Cuban diaspora living in Russia.
The indictment said the Federal Security Service is Russia’s principal security agency and the successor agency to the former Soviet Union’s Committee for State Security, which was known as the KGB.
Yuri Khrameev and two others charged in the indictment — Yaidel Delgado Suarez and Angel Eduardo Castro, both living in Russia — recruited a Venezuelan citizen living in Brooklyn to surveil and murder a prominent Russian dissident they believed to be residing in Washington, D.C., the indictment said.
It said the Brooklyn resident was sent to two locations associated with the targeted victim and was given “explicit instructions on how to conduct surveillance” while being promised $1,000 and $1,500 to carry out the work.
After conducting the surveillance and providing multiple photographs and videos of locations associated with the intended victim, the U.S. resident turned down the $40,000 that was offered to “eliminate” or “disappear” the target through murder, authorities said.
When the offer was rejected, the member of the intelligence services who made it offered multiple other people within the United States substantial amounts of money to finish the job, the indictment said.
