The jihadists’s revenue is reduced from $ 80 million a month to $56 million
Originally appeared at Politika, translated by A. Djurich/А. Ђурић exclusively for SouthFront
Bern – Income of terrorist organization Islamic State (IS) is constantly reducing, and for this there are many reasons. While it affects the terrorists, it has not incapacitated them. Europe is still a target, writes “Deutsche Welle”. Terrorists of IS have devised another way to come up with new sources of funding, but also to continue harassing others. Ordinary people are asked questions about the Quran, and if you do not know the answer, you must pay.
“Deutsche Welle” has released details of the study made by consulting firm “HIS” about financial situation of IS, according to which the Islamic state in mid-2015 still recorded a revenue of approximately 80 million US dollars per month, but now this amount is reduced to 56 million.
The Islamic State is still powerful in the region, but its financial losses are significant and are becoming an increasing challenge for their long-term survival, said study co-author Ludovic Karlino.
Air attacks by the Russians and Americans, according to the IHS information, powerfully hit IS. In the past 15 months, the Islamic State has lost about 22 percent of the territory, says Columbus Straka, also one of the authors of the study.
He says that even more dramatic is the loss of the number of people living in the area that IS controls. While at the beginning of last year in these areas were about nine million people, now under the control of IS there is only six million people.
Half of the budget comes from taxes and seizures. People who live in the area controlled by the IS have to pay taxes as determined by terrorists and it is often the case that their property is confiscated.
Oil sale provides 43 percent of revenues of the Islamic State, writes “Deutsche Welle”.
Terrorists are hit by losses of territories where oil is exploited. Americans have targeted oil installations. US forces have long tolerated the oil trade of the Islamic State, because it included too many civilians that would in case of attack turned against US, the report said.
“The Islamic State is financed even by donations. Most of them are from private institutions from the Gulf countries, particularly Saudi Arabia. The government in Riyadh, however, realized that it must fight against this”, says Sebastian Zons from the “German Society for Foreign Policy”. “The Saudis, however, failed to close financial resources from private circles, charities and foundations”, said Zons for DW.
Air strikes and advancement of Syrian and Iraqi military are striking IS even further, because the more you reduce the area that it controls, the lower revenues it receives, for example, from the ransom, as well as human trafficking and drug trafficking, according to the study.
The finances of IS are being slashed in other ways too. Iraqi banks located on the territory controlled by the IS are forbidden to carry out international transactions. In addition, the Iraqi government no longer sends salaries to the employees that are in the area.
Wages paid in the area controlled by IS were worth about $ 170 million per month. About 10 percent of that amount IS has levied as a “tax”.
Individuals and institutions that are associated with the Islamic State are placed on the black list at the international level. The persons whose name appears on those lists also can not perform any transactions.
“Islamic State has already reacted to these losses and halved salaries to their fighters”, reports the “New York Times”. Middle East expert Ginter Meyer of the “University of Mainz” warns that the terrorist organization is weakened, but it is not yet defeated. “Libya is a failed state. It is obvious that IS sees it as her future, so even in the event of military defeat in Syria and Iraq, it does not mean the end of IS”, says Meyer.
According to him, this terrorist organization is still able to operate “so there is no reduced risk of terrorist attacks in Europe”, Tanjug reports.
