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CRIME

Court denies extradition of Russian gangster

An Austria appeals court overturned the planned extradition to Russia of the alleged head of a brutal organised crime gang wanted by Moscow on Thursday, citing human rights concerns.

Published: 25 June 2015 21:22 CEST
Court denies extradition of Russian gangster
Austrian Palace of Justice. Photo: Oberster Gerichtshof (OGH)

A lower Vienna court had ruled in May that Aslan Gagiev, arrested in the Austrian capital in January, could be extradited to Russia where he is accused of personally carrying out at least six murders.

The gang's alleged victims include North Ossetia's deputy vice-president, the deputy public prosecutor, a mayor and the chief of police, Austrian federal police said at the time of his arrest.

But the appeals court said that it could not countenance his extradition because of “repeated violations of articles of the European convention on human rights… in custody” in Russia.

This came after the three judges examined reports from the Austrian embassy in Moscow and rights group Amnesty International and a 2012 ruling by the European Court of Human Rights.

The judges called on the lower court to seek assurances from Russia that Gagiev, who is of Georgian origin, can turn to the Austrian embassy at any time and for embassy staff to be able to visit him in jail.

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TERRORISM

Austrian investigators seize devices at Munich shooter’s home

Investigators seized electronic devices at the home of a young Austrian who fired shots near Israel's Munich consulate, but found no weapons or Islamic State group propaganda material, authorities said Friday.

Published: 7 September 2024 09:02 CEST
Austrian investigators seize devices at Munich shooter's home

German police shot dead the 18-year-old man on Thursday when he fired a vintage rifle at them near the diplomatic building.

They said they were treating it as a “terrorist attack”, apparently timed to coincide with the anniversary of the killings of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympic Games.

Authorities raided the gunman’s home in the Salzburg region, seizing electronic data carriers, Austria’s top security chief Franz Ruf told a press conference in Vienna on Friday.

READ ALSO: Munich Israeli consulate gunman was ‘Austrian national known to authorities’

During the raid, “no weapons or IS propaganda” material were found, Ruf added.

Despite being subject to a ban on owning and carrying weapons, the man managed to purchase a vintage carbine rifle fitted with a bayonet with around “fifty rounds of ammunition” for 400 euros ($445) the day before the attack, Ruf said.

He opened fire at around 9:00 am (0700 GMT) near the Israeli consulate, sparking a mobilisation of about 500 police in downtown Munich.

At a separate press conference in Munich, prosecutor Gabriele Tilmann said investigators were combing through the gunman’s electronic data but had yet to find conclusive evidence of his motive.

But the “working hypothesis” was that “the perpetrator acted out of Islamist or anti-Semitic motivation”, she told reporters.

Austrian police said on Thursday that the gunman, who had Bosnian roots, had previously been investigated on suspicion of links to terrorism.

Investigators last year found three videos he had recorded in 2021, showing scenes from a computer game “with Islamist content”, prosecutors said in a statement.

In one of them the suspect had used an avatar with a flag of the “al-Nusra Front”, a jihadist group active in Syria, said Ruf.

But the investigation was dropped in 2023 as there were no indications that he was active in “radical” circles, prosecutors said.

“The mere playing of a computer game or the re-enactment of violent Islamist scenes was not sufficient to prove intent to commit the offence,” they added.

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