| Submit your comments on this article |
| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| Jihadi groups still getting al-Qaeda, ISI support |
| 2005-07-15 |
| Islamic militant groups with links to Al Qaeda appear to have growing ties to the Kashmiri militants, and overlap with Pakistan's ISI. Bruce Hoffman, the chairman of the RAND Corporation,told the Los Angeles Times, "There is tremendous overlap, and that is the problem, between bin Laden and Al Qaeda, the Pakistani authorities and the Kashmiri groups." One of the analysts who works with him at the RAND Corporation, Rollie Lau says, "it's a relationship that's been evolving over time." "While the Kashmir conflict is more than five decades old," Ms. Lau says "some of the ties can be traced back to the Cold War, when the U.S. supported efforts to train fighters for the Soviet war next door in Afghanistan." She said " the relationship, I'd say, is not particularly new.To a large extent, these groups have been working together definitely, since 9-11 but prior to that, in different ways." The Kashmir conflict and Al Qaeda's base along the Afghan-Pakistan border is separated by hundreds of miles of rugged terrain. Despite the geographic division, U.S. analysts feel that that the groups share common goals of training, and more. She said that these groups share an intrinsic philosophical and ideological perspective. "They can share training, they can share information but beyond that, what you're seeing is a shared ideological perspective, that they fundamentally believe in things like a fundamentalist Islamic state or the overthrow of some of these regimes that they believe are apostate," Lau says. The key to Mr. Hoffman's analysis is the question of overlap between Pakistan's ISI and the Islamic militants, with ties to Al Qaeda and to the Kashmir conflict. The RAND Corporation's Rollie Lau believes the ISI ties are likely to be informal. But, she cautions, while there are definitely people within Pakistan's ISI who sympathize with Islamic militants, this does not mean that it is an official policy of President Musharraf's government. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has repeatedly promised that his government is pursuing al Qaeda, that the U.S. must not violate Pakistan's sovereignty to pursue Osama bin Laden and that he is cracking down on terrorist training camps. Senior U.S. counter-terrorism officials have claimed that Pakistan military and intelligence are well-aligned with the radical fundamentalists and that President Musharraf is in a pickle, he's trying to play it at both ends. But, Rollie Lau feels this strategy isn't working, that politically, President Musharraf is failing to satisfy both the Islamic militants, who want an nation based purely on their vision of Islamic law and the secularists. She feels that President Musharraf is angering many, and ignoring the vast middle of Pakistan, while personally religious, has a secular slant on politics. She's not convinced he can continue to isolate the secularists while failing to please the Islamic fundamentalists. Even U.S. officials have recognized, Pakistan's ISI continues to work closely with the Kashimir groups and maintains ties to the al-Qaeda related groups to protect the countries interests next door in Afghanistan. They aren't surprised that President Musharraf has not cracked down on the training camps, but Rollie Lau isn't convinced that he has the political capital and resources to actually do that. Washington analysts feel, this failure to crack down on terrorist training camps is beginning to chip away at the Washington-Islamabad alliance. And, the most recent example of how terrorism is being exported is the recent train and bus bombings in London. While the bombers were British citizens, they were of Pakistani descent. Its their ties to their homeland that have suspecting that terrorism is being exported to Western backyards. As British officials continue their investigation, their search has come to U.S. shores. The FBI is looking into an Egyptian born chemist, who taught at Leeds University, but did graduate work at North Carolina State University. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #2 Alternate 30 miles in the trunk SH. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2005-07-15 13:57 |
| #1 Give everyone 30 days to move out of the disputed region then make it ground zero for some Bikini Island tests - dispute over. 16 years of parenthood has probably warped my judgement with respect to the resolution of petty bickering. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2005-07-15 12:41 |