December 8, 2020 | Radical political Islamism has received increasing attention, especially following the recent terror attack in Austria and the subsequent arrests that aimed to curtail this ideology in order to prevent future attacks. Whether this will be successful in preventing terrorism is debatable. However, such actions occurring so near Central and Eastern Europe underline an unprecedented need to explore the spread and influence of this ideology.

Supported by the Counter Extremism Project (CEP), GLOBSEC has begun mapping the efforts one of the best-known political Islamist movements, the Muslim Brotherhood, in a selection of countries in Central and Eastern Europe. The following questions drove our work: In what communities is the movement active? What organisations represent it? What access to the governments does it have? How do the organisations cooperate on the national and regional level?

At the conclusion of this project, we would like to present to you the latest results from the last two countries, North Macedonia and Bosnia Herzegovina, as well as the overall conclusions that can be drawn for the region as a whole.

Welcome: David Ibsen, Executive Director, CEP
Opening: Dr. Lorenzo Vidino, Director of the Program on Extremism, George Washington University

Presenters:            
Viktor Szucs, Research Fellow, GLOBSEC     
Andrea Marinković, Junior Research Fellow, GLOBSEC

Discussant:  Prof. Ešref Kenan Rašidagić, Head of Department of International Relations and European Studies, University of Sarajevo

Moderator: Dr. Hans-Jakob Schindler, Senior Director, CEP