The Pakistani media has reported that Qari Saifullah Akhtar, the Amir of the Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI), was picked up by the Dubai authorities on August 6, 2004, and handed over to the Pakistani authorities, who had him flown to Pakistan the next day. He is presently under interrogation by the Pakistani authorities. The HUJI and the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen (HUM) came into existence during the jihad in Afghanistan against the Soviet troops. The HUM became a founding-member of Osama bin Laden's International Islamic Front (IIF) for Jihad Against the Crusaders and the Jewish People in February, 1998. The HUJI joined it subsequently. The two are also members of the so-called 313 Brigade of the IIF, which has come into existence recently. The other members of the Brigade are the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LET), the HUM (Al-Alami), the Jaish-e-Muhammad (JUM), the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LEJ), the Jundullah (the Army of Allah), the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) and an unidentified group from the Xinjiang province of China.
The HUJI has an active branch in Bangladesh, which is identified by the US State Department as HUJI (B). Previously, jihadi recruits from South-East Asia used to go to Pakistan and Afghanistan for training in the training camps located there. Since last year, there have been reports that the HUJI (B) has been entrusted by the IIF with the responsibility for the training of the jihadi about 200 jihadis from S.E.Asia escape to Bangladesh by ship after the US started its military operations in Afghanistan in October, 2001. The HUJI had played an active role in the training of jihadi terrorist elements of the Caucasus region of Russia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan in cladestine camps set up in their respective territory. Its volunteers have also gone to Iraq to participate in the jihad against the US troops there. Of all the jihadi terrorist organisations of Pakistan, the HUJI and the Hizbut Tehrir have considerable following in the lower and middle ranks of the Armed Forces. In 1995, Gen. Abdul Waheed Kakkar, the then Chief of the Army Staff (COAS), had discovered a plot hatched by a small group of Army officers led by Maj-Gen.Zaheer-ul-Islam Abbasi, to stage an uprising, have Gen. Abdul Waheed and Mrs.Benazir Bhutto, the then Prime Minister, assassinated, seize power and proclaim the formation of an Islamic Caliphate in Pakistan. The HUJI was also found to have been involved in the plot. The implicated officers were all members of the HUJI. The officers and Qari Saifullah Akhtar were arrested. Strangely, while the officers were court-martialled and sentenced to various terms of imprisonment, the Qari was released from detention and not proceeded against. After seizing power on October 12,1999, Musharraf had Abbasi, a close friend of his, released. Since then, Abbasi had been quite active in various Islamist causes. |