A 13-year-old Estonian schoolboy has been revealed as the leader of the international neo-Nazi organisation Feuerkrieg Division (FKD). 

Estonia’s Internal Security Service (KAPO) caught the leader of the extremist group, a boy living in a small Estonian town who ran the organisation from his bedroom, as reported by Eesti Express. As a minor, the boy — who styled himself Kriegsherr or Commander — has not been named. 

According to the US-based NGO Anti-Defamation League, the small FKD organisation holds views that “are among the most extreme in the white supremacist movement”. It has been linked to several bomb threats. 

The ADL also charts the international spread of the group from its establishment in October 2018 in the Baltic states (most likely Estonia) to expand its international footprint to Belgium, England,  Germany, Ireland, Latvia, the Netherlands, Norway and Russia. Last year the group made a push to recruit in Europe, the US and Canada. 

Giving the discovery a domestic political dimension in Estonia, according to local media reports the boy is believed to have been in contact with Ruuben Kaalep, an MP with the Estonian Conservative People’s Party (EKRE), via an online forum. One of the names found in a forum created by the network’s founder is Kert Valter, a pseudonym used by Kaalep, according to local media reports. 

EKRE is the junior coalition partner of Estonian Prime Minister Juri Ratas’ Centre party. Since joining the government, the party has been embroiled in a series of scandals involving a conflict of interest involving an adviser to agriculture minister Mart Jarvik who was sacked in November, minister of trade and IT Kert Kingo who resigned after being accused of lying to parliament on the issue of hiring a controversial advisor, and a diplomatic incident that erupted when Interior Minister Mart Helme called Finland’s Prime Minister Sanna Marin a “cashier” who was working to “try to liquidate” Finland.