France: ISIS-supporting Chechen released from custody after planning to attack teenage Islam critic Mila

FILE - In this June 21, 2021 file photo, the teen who has been identified publicly only by her first name, Mila, leaves the courtroom in Paris. A French court on Wednesday convicted 11 of 13 people pin a landmark cyberbullying case for their harassment and threats against the teenager who savaged Islam in online posts. The court handed down suspended prison sentences of four to six months and fines. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus,File)
By Robert
5 Min Read

An ISIS-supporting Chechen student who enjoys status as a ‘political refugee’ is now out of jail after police arrested him last week for planning to attack an 18-year-old French girl who criticized Islam over social media last winter.

French police arrested the Chechen high school student, aged 17, at his parent’s home last Tuesday after the young budding jihadist was found to have been recruiting accomplices over social media to carry out an attack on Mila, a teenager from Lyon who’s regularly threatened with violence for opposing Islam and promoting secularism, Actu 17 reports.

FILE – In this June 3, 2021 file photo, the teenager identifying herself online as Mila leaves at the courtroom with her lawyer Richard Malka, in Paris. A French court on Wednesday convicted 11 of 13 people pin a landmark cyberbullying case for their harassment and threats against the teenager who savaged Islam in online posts. The court handed down suspended prison sentences of four to six months and fines. (AP Photo/Francois Mori, File)

The investigation began back in July when judicial police caught wind that the 17-year-old, who was believed to be a supporter of radical Islam, had “called for a smart plan to be implemented against Mila”.

Following his arrest by RAID, an elite tactical unit in the French National Police, the suspect was taken into police custody and the home of his parents, who also enjoy political refugee status, was searched. Police, after combing through his personal property and electronic devices, discovered the 17-year-old had been spreading ISIS propaganda videos and regularly interacting with jihadists in the Middle East.

Despite the threats against Mila and ISIS terrorist material he was spreading, the teenager will do no jail time. After being slapped with an indictment for defending terrorism, the 17-year-old Chechen ‘refugee’ was subsequently released and placed under judicial supervision. 

Mila responded to the court’s decision by taking to social media, writing: “Before our eyes, justice leaves an avenue for terrorist acts. Refuse it.” 

The Chechen high school student is one of only many suspects to have been arrested by French authorities for threatening to cause harm to Mila. Earlier this year, in March, six people – five men and a woman – aged 18 to 35 were taken into police custody for online moral harassment and making death threats against the then 17-year-old girl.  

The month before, five people were arrested for making similar threats against the young girl. 

Mila first became a target of radical Islamists in January of 2020 after she posted a video critical of Islam to social media. Since then she has faced tens of thousands of death threats, cannot attend school, and lives under 24-hour police protection. Her personal address and the address of her parents have both been posted to the internet. 

Those who have defended Mila have been subjected to the same brutal treatment. 

In April, Remix News & Views reported that Floraine Gouget, a young French woman who has openly defended Mila, faced widespread harassment and censorship on social media for doing so. Since coming out as a defender of Mila, Gouget, aged 18, has founded the Last Hope Association to promote secularism and to demonstrate that religious characters, such as those depicting the Islamic prophet Muhammad, should not be taboo within French society. 

For openly opposing the Islamization of France, Gouget, like Mila, has faced a torrent of death threats, her Twitter account has been hacked, and her personal address, as well as the address of her parents, has been posted to the internet.

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