Eye on Extremism
February 27, 2020
Reuters:
U.S. Targets Iranian-Backed Militia Active In Iraq - State
Department
“The United States on Wednesday blacklisted a senior member of
Iranian-backed Kataib Hezbollah militia, punishing it for its attacks
targeting U.S. forces, most recently for killing an American
contractor in an Iraqi military base near the northern city of Kirkuk.
The U.S. State Department said it has designated Ahmad al-Hamidawi as
a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT), Secretary General of
Kataib Hezbollah (KH), an Iran-backed terrorist group active in Iraq
and Syria, which Washington designated as terrorist organization in
2009. “The Kataib Hezbollah group continues to present a threat to
U.S. forces in Iraq,” Nathan Sales, the State Department’s
counterterrorism coordinator, said at a news briefing. “We’re adding
to the pressure that has existed on this group for a decade.”
Washington has blamed Iran-backed paramilitary groups for increasingly
regular rocketing and shelling of bases hosting U.S. forces in Iraq
and of the area around the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. An attack last
month hit the U.S. Embassy compound itself, and a rocket attack on a
military base in the north in December killed a U.S. civilian
contractor.”
The
Wall Street Journal: U.S. Blacklists Lebanese Companies, Individuals
With Alleged Ties To Hezbollah
“The Trump administration’s blacklisting Wednesday of several
Lebanese individuals and companies for allegedly helping Iran-backed
Hezbollah highlights Washington’s strategy to counter a
U.S.-designated terror group. The Treasury Department blacklisted
three officials and 11 entities linked to the Lebanon branch of the
Martyrs Foundation, a group the U.S. designated in 2007 as supporting
terrorism and officials say is used by Iran’s government as an
instrument for its broader strategic aims. The move is part of the
Trump administration’s effort to pressure Iran and its proxies that
are battling the U.S. and its allies across several fronts in the
region, including in Syria and Iraq. Washington hopes to choke off the
funding needed to finance those conflicts and to show that Hezbollah’s
military wing—which is widely viewed internationally as a terror
group—is integrated with the rest of Hezbollah’s structure, to deplete
the group’s ability to threaten the U.S. and its allies. The choice of
targets offers insight into a critical front in the U.S. strategy to
erode Hezbollah’s—and therefore Iran’s—influence in the region, as
well as the risks that Washington’s pressure campaign represents to
Lebanon’s economy.”
Newsroom:
Germany Shooting A Christchurch
Copycat?
“Dr. Hans-Jakob Schindler, a senior director with the Counter
Extremism Project, says there were likely different reasons for the
similarities in attack tactics between Hanau and Christchurch. In the
case of the Christchurch accused, “there was a deliberate attempt to
basically do an Islamic State tactic: attack one place, let the
security forces go, until they arrive at that place, you're already at
the next place to do an attack and you have then even longer in the
second place to conduct your attack”. Meanwhile, the Hanau shooter
moved to his next location only because there was no one left to fire
at in the first bar, Schindler said. Schindler agrees there are
similarities between the attacks but, like Spoonley, emphasises we
don't know of a direct link. “Yes, there are these similarities,” he
said. However, “we went through all [the Hanau shooter's] material
online. There were lots of links to conspiracy theories, lots of links
to just wacky stuff on the net. It didn't seem that there was any
provable connection to Christchurch. Obviously no one could have
escaped the events in Christchurch because it was just all over the
media, so in detail and so intensively, so one could argue that the
way he's done it, the way the things unfolded, seems very much
inspired by Christchurch.”
United States
Fox
News: Trump Administration Launches New Unit To Strip US Citizenship
From Foreign-Born Terrorists, Criminals
“The Trump administration is establishing a new section within the
Justice Department to deal with the process of removing citizenship
from foreign-born individuals who fraudulently obtained citizenship by
failing to disclose past convictions for serious crimes -- including
terrorism and war crimes. The section, which will be within the DOJ’s
Office of Immigration Litigation, will be dedicated to denaturalizing
those who had failed to disclose they had been involved in criminal
activity on their N-400 form for naturalization. It requires the
government to show that citizenship was obtained illegally or
“procured by concealment of a material fact or by willful
misrepresentation.” That form includes questions asking whether an
applicant has been involved in genocide and torture among other
serious crimes, if they have ever been part of a terrorist or
totalitarian organization, if they had been associated with the Nazi
government in Germany, and if they have been charged or convicted with
a crime or served prison time. Targets for denaturalization are those
who have made material breaches of those questions. “When a terrorist
or sex offender becomes a U.S. citizen under false pretenses, it is an
affront to our system -- and it is especially offensive to those who
fall victim to these criminals,” Assistant Attorney General Jody Hunt
said.”
Military.com:
Navy Resumes Flight Training For Saudi Troops After Pensacola Terror
Attack
“Service members from Saudi Arabia are back to conducting flight
training in the U.S. nearly three months after it was halted following
a fatal terror attack on a Florida military base. Saudi international
military students resumed flight training Tuesday, Navy officials
announced. The move follows a host of new restrictions placed on
foreign troops, limiting their access to Navy and Marine Corps bases
and banning them from having personal firearms while they're in the
U.S. The Navy will continue reviewing its policies for training
foreign troops, Lt. Cmdr. Megan Isaac, a Navy spokeswoman at the
Pentagon, said in a statement Wednesday. “The Navy is making every
effort to minimize disruptions to our foreign national partners while
implementing the revised security initiatives,” she added. The
services were ordered to review their policies on foreign military
trainees after a 21-year-old member of the Royal Saudi Air Force
brought a weapon that he purchased lawfully in Florida onto Naval Air
Station Pensacola. Three sailors were killed and several more wounded
when he opened fire on a classroom there. The Pentagon announced it
would pause all operational training for 850 Saudi troops on Dec. 10,
four days after the attack.”
ABC
15: FBI: Arrests Made In 'Violent Extremist Group' Investigation
Involving Arizona
“The FBI announced Wednesday that four arrests have been made amid
the investigation of a violent extremist group with a connection to
Arizona. During a press conference Wednesday, officials said the
arrests were made during the joint investigation involving Washington,
Texas, Arizona and Florida. The investigation reportedly involved
“racially motivated violent extremists from across the U.S...charged
today in U.S District Court in Seattle with a conspiracy to threaten
and intimidate journalists and activists,” officials say. The
defendants charged in the conspiracy include: Johnny Roman Garza, 20,
of Queen Creek, Arizona; Cameron Brandon Shea, 24, of Redmond,
Washington; Kaleb Cole, 24, of Montgomery, Texas; and Taylor Ashley
Parker-Dipeppe, 20, of Spring Hill, Florida. The defendants reportedly
used an encrypted online chat group to identify journalists and others
they wanted to intimidate who they thought “threatened their
ideology,” officials said Wednesday. “Defendants Cole and Shea created
the posters, which included Nazi symbols, masked figures with guns and
Molotov cocktails, and threatening language,” a press release says.
“The posters were delivered to Atomwaffen members electronically and
the coconspirators printed and delivered or mailed the posters to
journalists or activists the group was targeting.”
Syria
The
Washington Post: Inside Embattled Idlib Province: A Syrian Offensive
Wreaks Terror On Children
“The market bombing had driven Ahmed and his family from their town
in southern Idlib province and onto the road, to join hundreds of
thousands of other people searching for safety, the teen recalled. A
Russian plane had circled overhead, and then the bombs fell,
obliterating a car, its driver and other people who were passing by on
motorcycles. The attack a few weeks ago was terrible but hardly the
worst he had seen. Five years ago, an airstrike had killed dozens of
people in the town square. Now, at 13, Ahmed is living in the clammy
basement of a sports stadium in Idlib city, with hundreds of other
displaced people who have crowded in over recent weeks. As he spoke,
warplanes could be heard circling overhead again. Guards warned people
to stay indoors. But Ahmed — the stoic survivor of a war and no longer
a child — didn’t flinch. “Safety comes from God,” he said. The last
month has been especially brutal in Idlib province, with a Syrian
government offensive producing a humanitarian crisis almost
unparalleled during nearly a decade of war in Syria. As the government
seeks to recapture rebel-held Idlib, where children make up a majority
of the population, the fighting has chased about 1 million people from
their homes.”
Asharq
Al-Awsat: Concerns Among Damascus Residents After Several
Blasts
“Damascus witnessed several explosions in the past two weeks that
have raised concerns among the capital's residents and its neighboring
cities after the regime declared these areas as “safe” two years ago.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) documented six
explosions in Damascus between the 7th and 25th of February, which
were all caused by detonating IEDs in vehicles, killing five persons
and wounding 15 others. On February 7, an IED exploded in Khaled bin
al-Walid Street in Damascus killing two regime soldiers. Three days
later, a regime intelligence official was killed after his vehicle had
been targeted by an IED explosion near al-Jala hall in al-Mazzeh
neighborhood. The third explosion on February 18 killed one man after
an IED exploded in his vehicle in Bab Moussalla neighborhood, SOHR
reported. On February 20, al-Marjeh area was struck by an explosion
targeting a military vehicle injuring several. The last two explosions
took place on the 25th of February, in separate incidents. One
explosion was in the al-Barakemah area, which killed one person and
injured others, while the other explosion left several persons injured
in the tunnel of al-Omawiyyin Square.”
Iraq
Kurdistan
24: 39 ISIS Members Killed In Overnight Iraqi
Operations
“Iraq's military communications center said on Wednesday that
anti-terror forces, backed by the international anti-ISIS coalition,
had killed 39 members of the so-called Islamic State in clashes in
northern parts of Salahuddin Province. The operation comes as the
terrorist organization continues to carry out insurgency-style
attacks, often in and near territories of disputed claim between the
Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and the federal Iraqi government.
In recent months, the group has increasingly relied on kidnapping
civilians from rural parts of these areas and holding them for ransom,
fueling security concerns among local residents. In the third reported
case in recent weeks, suspected Islamic State militants released two
Kurds from Kirkuk in exchange for $80,000 paid by family members. This
week's military operation took place outside of Kirkuk, where
counter-terrorism units clashed with Islamic State sleeper cells in
the Khanoka Mountains located about 100 kilometers north of the city
of Tikrit near the Tigris River, read a statement from Iraq's Security
Media Cell. The military press office noted that the operation was
launched in “difficult geography” which has made the region a “haven”
for Islamic State members since they lost all their Iraqi territory in
2017.”
Afghanistan
CNN:
If The Taliban Regain Power, I Could Lose
Everything
“It's midnight in Kabul as I write this. Afghans have gone to
sleep, many of them in the hopes that a partial truce negotiated
between the United States and Taliban will yield a reduction in
violence. We -- along with the rest of the world -- learned of this
development when US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tweeted about it on
Friday evening. But for millions of Afghans like me, a reduction in
violence is not enough. According to President Ashraf Ghani, 20 terror
groups are currently active in Afghanistan. If the Taliban come to
control our country once more, it seems little will prevent any one of
these groups from gaining strength and acting on their most evil
impulses. Now let me be clear, I am not worried that the partial
truce, going on now, will be violated. Seven days are not my concern.
I am worried about the next seven months and the next seven years. As
US troops begin their likely withdrawal from Afghanistan, so many
Afghans hope that 2020 will not resemble the early 1990s, when civil
war and extremist forces came to dominate our politics and our lives.
In 1991, I was in fifth grade in a Kabul public school when the
Mujahideen, an insurgent group opposing the communist-backed
government, attacked the capital city and raided our school.”
Voice
Of America: Kabul Blast, Attacks Elsewhere Challenge Afghan
Truce
“A bombing in the Afghan capital, Kabul, Wednesday injured at least
nine civilians, the first significant incident of violence during the
weeklong reduced fighting period agreed to between U.S.-backed Afghan
security forces and Taliban insurgents. Afghan Interior Ministry
spokesman Nasrat Rahimi said the improvised explosive device was
planted in a motorcycle. He said a woman was among the casualties.
Rahimi added an investigation was underway to determine who was behind
the attack. There were no immediate claims of responsibility. The
Taliban swiftly denied its involvement, saying the blast “seems to be
the malicious work of intelligence networks trying to create
distrust.” The seven-day reduction in violence pact took effect last
Saturday and it is to culminate on the signing of a peace agreement
between the United States and the Taliban scheduled for Feb. 29 in
Doha, Qatar. Afghan officials alleged Wednesday insurgents have
carried out attacks in several provinces since the partial agreement
took effect, killing around two dozen people, mostly security
personnel. There was no immediate reaction from the Taliban to Kabul’s
allegations, though the insurgent group insists it had agreed with the
U.S. to observe a reduction in violence and not a “cease-fire.”
Frontline:
Why A U.S.-Taliban Peace Deal Could Strengthen ISIS In
Afghanistan
“The U.S.-led war in Afghanistan began nearly two decades ago in a
post-9/11 bid to kill Osama bin Laden, destroy Al Qaeda and oust its
ruling ally, the Taliban. More than 18 years and tens of thousands of
deaths later, the Trump administration is negotiating with a resurgent
Taliban — and both sides have said that they are prepared to sign a
peace deal on Feb. 29. The signing of the deal, which is contingent on
the successful completion of a week-long reduction in violence meant
to show the U.S. that Taliban leadership has control over its fighters
on the ground, is expected to involve an agreement to draw down U.S.
troops in the country and to open the door to talks between the
Taliban and the Afghan government. But according to recent FRONTLINE
reporting from inside Afghanistan, a U.S.-Taliban peace deal could
have unintended consequences inside the country: an increase in
membership for ISIS, as Taliban fighters unhappy with their group’s
participation in the peace process defect. “With this peace deal, you
will see the caliphate rise,” an ISIS commander in Afghanistan told
FRONTLINE correspondent Najibullah Quraishi. “Taliban fighters have
promised to join us. We won’t rest until we implement the caliphate
across the entire world.”
Yemen
Arab
News: US To Stop Aid In Yemen’s Houthi Areas If Militants Don’t
Budge
“USAID said late Monday that it will suspend aid to
Houthi-controlled areas in Yemen, where most of the country’s people
live, if the militants don’t remove impediments obstructing aid
operations. A spokesperson said that the agency said it informed
partners including UN agencies about the plan last week. The official
said the suspension will start in late March if Houthis take no
action. “We continue to do everything we can to avoid a reduction in
aid in northern Yemen,” the official said, speaking on condition of
anonymity in line with agency regulations. The US provided about $700
million in aid to Yemen last year. It is among the largest donors to
Yemen, where a UN aid program totaling $8.35 billion since 2015 is
vital to keeping many Yemenis alive. The UN calls the situation in
Yemen the world’s worst humanitarian crisis. As the war in Yemen
enters its sixth year, 10 million people in the country are on the
brink of famine and 80% of the population of 29 million need of aid,
according to the UN More than 3 million people have been displaced,
cholera epidemics have killed hundreds, and at least 2.2 million
children under 5 suffer from severe malnutrition, the agency
said.”
Nigeria
New
York Post: Islamists In Nigeria Are Destroying Christian
Communities
“It was faith that compelled us to travel to Nigeria last week to
see for ourselves the simmering crisis threatening parts of Africa’s
wealthiest and most populous country. “Do not stand by idly,” the Book
of Leviticus commands, “when the blood of your neighbor is being
spilled” (19:16). Well, blood is flowing like a river through this
sprawling country, and it is being spilled at the hands of the
Islamist terrorists of Boko Haram and lawless tribesmen. Dozens of
victims shared accounts of almost incomprehensible suffering. A
9-year-old girl told us about watching terrorists murder her parents
and siblings with machetes. A pastor whose church had been destroyed
twice met with us soon after negotiating the release of two female
parishioners kidnapped by Boko Harem while en route to a Christmas
celebration. The young women next to him, newly released, still
showing signs of shock. They recounted how the terrorists had captured
them at their “checkpoint” within earshot of a state police outpost.
One of the young women was sharp enough to keep her phone on and
concealed. It allowed the local authorities to locate them. Yet
government troops who came within visual distance of the girls chose
not to rescue them.”
Sahara
Reporters: Rehabilitation Of Boko Haram Insurgents Signals Recycling
Of Terrorism In Nigeria
—Okei-Odumakin
“Dr Joe Okei-Odumakin, Convener of Nigerians Unite Against Terror,
has described a bill seeking to create an agency that would see to the
rehabilitation, deradicalisation and integration of repentant Boko
Haram terrorists in the country as a means of recycling terrorism.
Okei-Odumakin stated that one of the major roles of elected
politicians was to keep the country safe. She said, “We strongly feel
that the bill offers further concessions to Boko Haram militants still
terrorising the country which would further embolden them. “There is
an insinuation that terrorism in the entire North-East was raised and
promoted by some politicians. “What started as recruitment and
indoctrination of young minds against the value system of Western
world, has now snowballed into killing innocent civilians and
uniformed men irrespective of creed and religion. “We rise in unison
as a people of conscience and condemn such cruelty and assault on our
collective value for life.”
Africa
The
New York Times: Terrorism Threat In West Africa Soars As U.S. Weighs
Troop Cuts
“The Trump administration is split over how to combat terrorists,
support allies and thwart global competitors in West Africa. And the
mixed messages out of Washington are confusing allies in Europe, who
are deeply committed to security in Africa, as well as to military
partners on the continent. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo just wrapped
up a major trip to Africa, including a stop in Senegal, pledging more
security support and warning against growing Chinese influence. But
back in Washington, Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper is weighing deep
U.S. troop cuts on the continent, closing a new $110 million drone
base and ending aid to French forces battling militants who are
surging in Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso. The muddled administration
policy comes at a time when skyrocketing waves of terrorism and
violence have seized Africa’s Sahel region, a vast sub-Saharan
scrubland that stretches from Senegal to Sudan, and is threatening to
spread. Cutting American aid could not only weaken French-led
counterterrorism efforts, analysts say. It could also open the door to
China and Russia, which are ready to seize any foothold the United
States cedes on the continent, dangling deals for new ports and
railroads as well as arms and mercenaries, and overall influence.”
Voice
Of America: Islamic State Stepping Up Attacks In
Mozambique
“Militants affiliated with the Islamic State terror group have
increased their attacks in recent weeks against security forces and
civilians in the restive northern region of Mozambique. This week, IS
announced via its Amaq News Agency that its affiliate in Central
Africa had killed nine soldiers from the Mozambican army in the
province of Cabo Delgado. Local news also reported clashes between
Mozambican security forces and Islamist insurgents near a village in
the Muslim-majority region. Since 2017, Islamist militants have
carried out deadly attacks against the military and local residents in
Cabo Delgado, killing hundreds of people and displacing thousands
others. But U.N. officials say there has been a dramatic increase of
such attacks in recent months. “Armed groups have been randomly
targeting local villages and terrorizing the local population. … We
have reports of beheadings, kidnappings and disappearances of women
and children,” said Andrej Mahecic, spokesperson of the U.N. refugee
agency (UNHCR), during a recent news briefing. “The attacks have now
spread across nine out of the 16 districts in Cabo Delgado.”
U.S.
News & World Report: 3 Irish Soldiers Injured In Mali Roadside
Bomb Attack
“Three Irish soldiers were injured in a roadside bomb attack on a
multinational convoy of United Nations peacekeepers in Mali, the
German military said Wednesday. The Bundeswehr said the attack came
Tuesday afternoon on the German-led convoy in northern Mali, about 80
kilometers (50 miles) northeast of the city of Gao. The roadside bomb
hit a German vehicle being driven by Irish troops, injuring three
lightly. No German soldiers were injured. The Irish soldiers were
evacuated by Romanian helicopters to Gao to be treated in a German
hospital, the Bundeswehr said. The UN peacekeeping mission in Mali was
established in 2013 to help stabilize the northwestern African
nation.”
United Kingdom
Sky
News: New Terror Laws Come Into Force Two Days Before Extremist Due To
Be Freed From Prison
“Emergency legislation to prevent the automatic release of
terrorist prisoners has become law - two days before the latest
extremist offender was due for release. The government rushed the
Terrorist Offenders (Restriction of Early Release) Bill through
parliament, after two former terrorist prisoners went on to launch
attacks in London within two months of each other. The change will
affect around 50 prisoners, due for automatic release halfway through
their sentences, making sure they now serve at least two-thirds of
their prison term before they are considered eligible for release.
Before being freed, they will now also need to pass a review by a
panel of specialist judges and psychiatrists at the Parole Board.
Sunderland shopkeeper Mohammed Zahir Khan, who was jailed for
four-and-a-half years in May 2018, was due for release on 28 February.
He was arrested after posting extremist material online calling for a
“year of fear” and pledging support for the terror group ISIS. The
change in legislation will allow authorities to keep him in prison for
another year, before he is considered for parole. The emergency
legislation was drawn up in the wake of the Streatham attack in south
London, earlier this month.”
The
Guardian: UK To Launch Specialist Cyber Force Able To Target Terror
Groups
“A specialist cyber force of hackers who can target hostile states
and terror groups is due to be launched later in the spring, after
many months of delays and turf wars between the Ministry of Defence
and GCHQ. The National Cyber Force – containing an estimated 500
specialists – has been in the works for two years but sources said
that after months of wrangling over the details, the specialist unit
was close to being formally announced. Britain is keen to be seen as a
“cyber power” able to disrupt against enemy states, targeting
satellite, mobile and computer networks as well as trying to take down
communications networks used by terror groups. The National Cyber
Force is a joint initiative between the Ministry of Defence and GCHQ,
and insiders said it would consolidate some existing capabilities as
well as develop new ones. However, officials are coy on details,
arguing that much of what the UK’s offensive hackers could do should
remain classified. Nor is the identity of its leader expected to be
publicly disclosed, although previous speculation that it would be a
woman is understood to be inaccurate.”
France
Reuters:
Paris Police Attacker Ran Web Search On Killing 'Infidels' Before
Rampage: Source
“A police employee who fatally stabbed four colleagues in the
force’s Paris headquarters ran an online search for “how to kill
infidels” an hour before he rampaged through the building, a judicial
source said on Wednesday. Data on the cell phone of Mickael Harpon, a
45-year-old IT worker who converted to Islam a decade before last
October’s attack, supported suspicions his motive was
terrorism-related, the judicial source and a police source told
Reuters. “His phone contained a lot of data but we have already
isolated one internet search carried out an hour before the attack:
‘how to kill infidels’,” the judicial source said, confirming a report
in daily Le Parisien. Harpon was shot dead by police at the scene
after he killed three officers and one administrative worker with a
kitchen knife. The investigation into the attack is being led by
anti-terrorism prosecutors, which usually indicates a possible
terrorism link is the focus of inquiries. The judicial source said it
took several months to break the codes Harpon had used to secure his
personal smartphone. Both sources said the data recovered on it
appeared to confirm suspicions Harpon had been radicalised. The police
source, however, cautioned that no evidence had yet been found that
Harpon had links to militant group Islamic State, which claimed the
attack, or that he had planned it far in advance. The data analysis
was still ongoing.”
Germany
Daily
Sabah: Berlin Tightens Security Measures In Mosques After Deadly
Terrorist Attack
“Berlin has increased security measures at mosques across the
country to shore up the safety of its Muslim residents in the wake of
far-right terrorism that recently rocked the country with a number of
deadly attacks. Speaking on Tuesday, State Minister of the Interior of
Berlin Andreas Geisel of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD)
announced that mosques, particularly the larger ones, would be guarded
by both uniformed and civil police officers, especially during the
Friday prayers, while the police presence around mosques would be
enhanced, the minister added. Geisel underlined that measures would
also be taken regarding the structure of buildings. In a reminder that
previously, a protective door at a synagogue in Halle had “prevented a
massacre,” the interior minister said that in order for mosques to
have similar security measures as well, 10 million euros would be
allocated to the 2020-2021 budget. Currently, there are 107 mosques in
Berlin. The anti-Semitic attack mentioned by the minister took place
on Oct. 9 in the state of Saxony-Anhalt and involved a German man
armed with explosives and a gun trying, but ultimately failing, to
gain access to a synagogue in the city of
Halle.”
Europe
The
National: ISIS Still Targeting Swedish City Despite Closure Of
Extremist School
“Swedish authorities have warned Islamic extremists are still
targeting a vulnerable city despite having closed a school over
radicalisation concerns. Sweden’s security service Sapo says ISIS
radicalisation is still taking place in areas of Gothenburg. It comes
after the authorities shutdown the state-funded Islamic
Vetenskapsskolan school in the city after it was accused of hiring
ISIS fighters as teachers after their return from Syria. Officials
have been focusing on issues in Gothenburg as more than a third of
Swedish ISIS fighters are believed to have come from the city. Lisa
Pedersen, head of security coordination in the district administration
Angered, said extremist groups are still working to undermine the
authorities. “There are forces that want to weaken the democratic
systems,” she told Swedish Radio. “They say come to us for help and
support and do not go to social services or borrow money from us and
do not go to banks and this way they regain some kind of power.”
Latest figures from Sweden's security service Sapo reveal at least 300
of its citizens travelled to Syria and Iraq between 2012 and 2017 to
join extremist groups. It is believed half have returned, 100 are
still fighting and 50 were killed.”
Southeast Asia
The
Diplomat: What’s In The Philippines’ New Anti-Terrorism
Act?
“This week, the Philippine Senate approved a bill proposed last
year and designed to ease legal restrictions on law enforcement
officials to facilitate the conviction of suspects. While the legal
change is not without controversy, its significance bears noting as it
moves closer to reality. As I have observed previously in these pages,
Southeast Asia in general has been concerned about the latest wave of
terrorism stemming from the Islamic State and other linked groups over
the past few years. The Philippines has been among the countries most
affected by this, and concerns remain about the future trajectory of
the threat. As these developments have played out, as with other
countries, Manila has had to balance how it responds to immediate
crises, such as the one in Marawi that struck in 2017, with the
longer-term, comprehensive challenges of crafting an overall approach
to manage and countering violent extremism. One of the developments
within the Philippines’ counterterrorism approach is a new bill on the
issue led by Senator Panfilo Lacson, a former police chief and current
chair of the Senate Defense Committee.”
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