Tag Archives: Islamic State

Iraqi Kurdish leader says ‘yes’ vote won independence referendum

Kurds celebrate to show their support for the independence referendum in Erbil, Iraq September 25, 2017. REUTERS/Ahmed Jadallah

By Maher Chmaytelli and Ahmed Rasheed

BAGHDAD/ERBIL, Iraq (Reuters) – Iraqi Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani said on Tuesday that Kurds had voted “yes” to independence in a referendum held in defiance of the government in Baghdad and which had angered their neighbors and their U.S. allies.

The Kurds, who have ruled over an autonomous region within Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein, consider Monday’s referendum to be an historic step in a generations-old quest for a state of their own.

Iraq considers the vote unconstitutional, especially as it was held not only within the Kurdish region itself but also on disputed territory held by Kurds elsewhere in northern Iraq.

The United States, major European countries and neighbors Turkey and Iran strongly opposed the decision to hold the referendum, which they described as destabilizing at a time when all sides are still fighting against Islamic State militants.

In a televised address, Barzani said the “yes” vote had won and he called on Iraq’s central government in Baghdad to engage in “serious dialogue” instead of threatening the Kurdish Regional Government with sanctions.

The Iraqi government earlier ruled out talks on Kurdish independence and Turkey threatened to impose a blockade.

“We may face hardship but we will overcome,” Barzani said, calling on world powers “to respect the will of millions of people” who voted in the referendum.

Earlier, the Kurdish Rudaw TV channel said an overwhelming majority, possibly over 90 percent, had voted “yes”. Final results are expected by Wednesday.

Celebrations continued until the early hours of Tuesday in Erbil, capital of the Kurdish region, which was lit by fireworks and adorned with Kurdish red-white-green flags. People danced in the squares as convoys of cars drove around honking their horns.

In ethnically mixed Kirkuk, where Arabs and Turkmen opposed the vote, authorities lifted an overnight curfew imposed to maintain control. Kirkuk, located atop huge oil resources, is outside the Kurdish region but controlled by Kurdish forces that occupied it in 2014 after driving out Islamic State fighters.

In neighboring Iran, which also has a large Kurdish minority, thousands of Kurds marched in support of the referendum, defying a show of strength by Tehran which flew fighter jets over their areas.

The referendum has fueled fears of a new regional conflict. Turkey, which has fought a Kurdish insurgency within its borders for decades, reiterated threats of economic and military retaliation.

Barzani, who is president of the Kurdish Regional Government, has said the vote is not binding, but meant to provide a mandate for negotiations with Baghdad and neighboring countries over the peaceful secession of the region from Iraq.

IRAQI OPPOSITION

Baghdad said there would be no such talks.

“We are not ready to discuss or have a dialogue about the results of the referendum because it is unconstitutional,” Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said on Monday night.

Abadi ordered the Kurds to hand over control of their airports to the central government within three days or face an international embargo on flights.

Abadi, a moderate from Iraq’s Shi’ite Arab majority, is coming under pressure at home to take punitive measures against the Kurds. Hardline Iranian-backed Shi’ite groups have threatened to march on Kirkuk.

“We as Popular Mobilisation would be fully prepared to carry out orders from Abadi if he asks to liberate Kirkuk and the oilfields from the separatist militias,” said Hashim al-Mouasawi, a spokesman for the al-Nujabaa paramilitary group.

The Kurds, who speak their own language related to Persian, were left without a state of their own when the Ottoman empire crumbled a century ago. Around 30 million are scattered in northern Iraq, southastern Turkey and parts of Syria and Iran.

The autonomous region they control in Iraq is the closest the Kurds have come in modern times to a state. It has flourished, largely remaining at peace while the rest of Iraq has been in a continuous state of civil war for 14 years.

Since the fall of Saddam, they have had to carefully balance their ambitions for full independence with the threat of a backlash from their neighbors and the reluctance of Washington to redraw borders.

In the past four years they achieved a measure of economic independence by opening a route to sell oil through pipelines to a port in Turkey. But that still leaves them at the mercy of Ankara, which draws a firm line at formal independence.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan warned that Iraqi Kurds would go hungry if Turkey imposed sanctions, and said military and economic measures could be used against them.

“This referendum decision, which has been taken without any consultation, is treachery,” he said, repeating threats to cut off the pipeline.

The Kurds say the referendum acknowledges their contribution in confronting Islamic State after it overwhelmed the Iraqi army in 2014 and seized control of a third of Iraq.

Voters were asked to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to the question: “Do you want the Kurdistan Region and Kurdistani areas outside the (Kurdistan) Region to become an independent country?”

Iraqi soldiers joined Turkish troops for military exercises in southeast Turkey on Tuesday near the border with the Kurdistan region. Turkey also took the Rudaw TV channel off its satellite service TurkSat.

STATE DEPARTMENT

Iraq’s Kurds have been close allies of the United States since Washington offered them protection from Saddam in 1991. But the United States has long encouraged the Kurds to avoid unilateral steps so as not to jeopardize the stability of Iraq or antagonize Turkey.

The U.S. State Department said it was “deeply disappointed” by the decision to conduct the referendum but Washington’s relationship with region’s people would not change.

Asked about the referendum, White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said on Monday: “We hope for a unified Iraq to annihilate ISIS (Islamic State) and certainly a unified Iraq to push back on Iran.”

The European Union regretted that the Kurds had failed to heed its call not to hold the referendum and said Iraqi unity remained essential in facing the threat from Islamic State.

The Kremlin said Moscow backed the territorial integrity of countries in the region. Unlike other powers, Russia had not directly called on the Kurds to cancel the referendum. Moscow has quietly pledged billions of dollars in investment in the past year, becoming the biggest funders of the Kurds.

Iran banned flights to and from Kurdistan on Sunday, while Baghdad asked foreign countries to stop oil trading with the Kurdish region and demanded that the KRG hand over control of its international airports and border posts with Iran, Turkey and Syria.

Iranian Major General Yahya Rahim Safavi, a top adviser to the Supreme Leader, called on “the four neighboring countries to block land borders” with the Iraqi Kurdish region, according to state news agency IRNA. Tehran supports Shi’ite Muslim groups that are powerful in Baghdad.

Syria, embroiled in a civil war and whose Kurds are pressing ahead with their own self-determination, also rejected the referendum.

KRG Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani said he hoped to maintain good relations with Turkey.

“The referendum does not mean independence will happen tomorrow, nor are we redrawing borders,” he said in Erbil on Monday. “If the ‘yes’ vote wins, we will resolve our issues with Baghdad peacefully.”

(Additional reporting by Ece Toksabay in ANKARA and Umit Bektas in HABUR, Turkey; Editing by Philippa Fletcher, Peter Graff and Giles Elgood)

Iranians pour onto the streets to mourn soldier beheaded in Syria

By Babak Dehghanpisheh

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Thousands of people took to the streets of Tehran on Wednesday to bury a soldier whose beheading by Islamic State has come to symbolize the righteousness of Iran’s military involvement in Syria.

In what has become an iconic image on Iranian media, 25-year-old Revolutionary Guard Mohsen Hojaji is shown looking calmly into camera after his capture as he is led away by an insurgent with blood on his face, holding a knife. The photograph was posted by Islamic State.

Even Iranians critical of their government’s military intervention in Syria to help President Bashar al-Assad have taken to social media to express their admiration for Hojaji, who was killed last month.

The Revolutionary Guards, Iran’s most powerful military force who also oversee an economic empire worth billions of dollars, were initially quiet about their role in Syria.

But in recent years, as casualties have mounted, they have been more outspoken about their engagement, framing it as an existential struggle against the Sunni Muslim extremists of Islamic State who see Shi’ites, the majority of Iran’s population, as apostates.

Guards killed in Syria and Iraq are touted as protectors of Shi’ite holy sites and labeled “defenders of the shrine” on websites linked to the Guards.

Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei prayed over Hojaji’s coffin and met with his family on Wednesday, state media reported.

Large crowds carrying red flags, symbolizing martyrdom, and pictures of Hojaji processed to the funeral in Tehran, pictures on state TV showed. Parliament speaker Ali Larijani and former president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were among the dignitaries who attended, state media said.

“Look at what a stir the martyrdom of this youth has created in the country,” Khamenei said, according to his website.

Hojaji’s funeral comes only three days before Ashura, one of the most important religious events for Shi’ites and a traditional period of mourning which commemorates the death of Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Mohammed.

The Guards recovered Hojaji’s body through a deal between Islamic State, the Syrian army and Lebanese Shi’ite group Hezbollah. More than 300 IS fighters and about 300 family members were allowed to evacuate Syria’s western border with Lebanon under the ceasefire agreement.

On June 7, Islamic State claimed an attack on Tehran’s parliament and the mausoleum of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic, killing 18 people. The Revolutionary Guards fired missiles at Islamic State bases in Syria on June 18 in response.

(Reporting by Babak Dehghanpisheh; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

Mattis arrives in Afghanistan as rockets hit Kabul airport

Mattis arrives in Afghanistan as rockets hit Kabul airport

By James Mackenzie and Hamid Shalizi

KABUL (Reuters) – U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis visited Kabul on Wednesday to pledge support for the government of President Ashraf Ghani, with the precarious security in the Afghan capital underlined by a rocket attack on the airport hours after he touched down.

Arriving from India, where he sought support for the U.S. administration’s new South Asia security plan, Mattis said the United States was determined not to allow “a merciless enemy to kill its way to power”.

Promising a more “holistic” approach without fixed timetables and involving other countries in the region, including Pakistan, he said the Taliban would have to learn they could not defeat the government.

“I want to reinforce to the Taliban that the only path to peace and political legitimacy for them is through a negotiated settlement,” Mattis told a joint news conference with Ghani and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.

The visit comes after U.S. President Donald Trump announced a new strategy for Afghanistan, promising a stepped-up military campaign against Taliban insurgents who have gained ground as they seek to reestablish Islamic law after their 2001 ouster.

But a rocket attack on Kabul airport that injured five civilians and was claimed by both Islamic State and Taliban insurgents highlighted the rebels’ ability to strike the Western-backed government.

Fighters holed up in a nearby building continued to resist security forces for hours, a spokesman for the interior minister said.

Mattis condemned the attack as a “criminal act by terrorists”, adding that it was a “classic definition of what the Taliban are up to here now”.

There are now about 8,400 U.S. troops in Afghanistan as part of the 13,500-strong NATO-led Resolute Support mission advising and training Afghan forces as well as a separate counterterrorism mission, targeting Islamic State and Al Qaeda.

As part of the new strategy, which will give U.S. commanders greater freedom to use American firepower against the Taliban, Mattis has said the United States will send an additional 3,000 troops to help train Afghan security forces.

It will also make greater use of its air power to support Afghan forces and strike the Taliban, a strategy that carries the risk of an increase in civilian casualties.

“I don’t want to tell the enemy exactly what we are doing but the whole point is to make certain we have a compelling battlefield advantage over anything the Taliban tries to mass against your forces,” he said.

Mattis said U.S. forces would do “everything humanly possible” to limit civilian casualties, which fueled bitter disputes between Washington and the government of former President Hamid Karzai.

Trump has said he expects NATO allies to step up contributions of both troops and funding to the Afghanistan mission, and Stoltenberg said the credibility of the international alliance depended on maintaining its support.

“We know the cost of staying in Afghanistan,” he said. “But the cost of leaving would be higher. If NATO forces leave too soon, there is a risk Afghanistan may return to a state of chaos and once again become a safe haven for international terrorism.”

(Additional reporting by Mirwais Harooni and Mostafa Hashem in Cairo; Editing by Nick Macfie)

One week to cross a street: how IS pinned down Filipino soldiers in Marawi

One week to cross a street: how IS pinned down Filipino soldiers in Marawi

By Tom Allard

MARAWI CITY, Philippines (Reuters) – With a grimace, Brigadier General Melquiades Ordiales of the Philippines 1st Marine Brigade recounted the painful gains made against Islamist militants in Marawi City.

“It took us one week from this point to that point, to cross that street,” he said, casting his eyes to the other side of a two-lane road in the heart of the southern Philippines city, lined by three-storey buildings shattered by air strikes and the remaining walls riddled with bullet holes.

“It was really very, very tough.”

The grinding urban warfare that has destroyed much of the grandly named Sultan Omar Dianalan Boulevard shows just how much of a threat Islamic State is to the Philippines and potentially other countries in the Southeast Asian region.

But when the fighting started, Philippine authorities were unfazed.

After the Islamic State-backed militants took over large parts of picturesque, lakeside Marawi in May, the country’s defense minister, Delfin Lorenzana, predicted the entire conflict would be over in one week.

Now, after four months of intense aerial bombardment and house-by-house battles, Philippine commanders believe they are in the final stages of the operation to oust the rebels from the city.

In the past two weeks, military officials say they have conquered three militant bastions, including a mosque, and restricted about 60 remaining guerrillas to about 10 devastated city blocks in the business district. Patrols have been increased on the lake to prevent the supply of armaments and recruits to the holed-up militants.

HIGH-POWERED WEAPONS

Military officers who have skirmished for years with Islamic insurgents in the southern Philippines say the battle in Marawi has been more intense and difficult than earlier encounters.

The Islamic State militants are better armed, with high-powered weapons, night vision goggles, the latest sniper scopes and surveillance drones, said Captain Arnel Carandang, of the Philippines Army First Scout Ranger Battalion.

He said he has served for almost a decade in the remote jungles and mountains of Mindanao, the southern Philippines region that has long been wracked by insurgencies. Now, Carandang says, the military is in unfamiliar urban terrain.

The militants have exploited the battlefield to their advantage and held off Philippines forces despite a 10-to-1 numerical advantage for the government troops.

Borrowing heavily from Islamic State tactics in the Iraqi city of Mosul, they have surrounded themselves with hostages and used snipers and a network of tunnels.

Marawi’s underground drainage system and “rat holes” – crevices in the walls of high floors allowing access to adjacent buildings – have enabled the rebels to evade bombs and remain undetected, soldiers at the battlefront said.

“We believe there have been some foreign terrorists that have been directing their operations that’s why they are, how do I define this, really good,” said Carandang.

“We have seen some cadavers of foreigners. Some are white, some are black and some tall people we guess are Asians (from outside the Philippines). We have been hearing in their transmissions some English speaking terrorists.”

SCAVENGE FOR FOOD

Hostages – many of them Christians – have been deployed to build improvised explosive devices, scavenge for food and weapons in the heat of battle and fight for the Islamist rebels, according to those who escaped.

“When we were first moved to the mosque, there were more than 200 of us,” an escaped hostage, who asked not to be identified for safety reasons, told Reuters last week.

“We gradually became fewer. People would go on errands but they wouldn’t come back. They either escaped or died. By the time I left, there were only about 100 of us.”

The account could not be verified, but military officials confirmed the man escaped from Marawi in early August.

The hostage said the militants were excited by their successes in Marawi, speaking often of the advantages of urban warfare and talking about some of their next possible targets, including other cities in Mindanao and the Philippines capital Manila.

“They said they could hide well in the cities. They can get civilians to become hostages and it’s more difficult in the mountains with only the soldiers,” he said.

Many of the fighters are young recruits, who are fanatical and accomplished fighters, the soldiers said.

“By the way they move and their tactics, you can see they’ve been trained,” said Colonel Jose Maria Cuerpo, deputy commander of the 103rd Brigade fighting in Marawi.

For a description of how Mindanao youngsters are recruited by militants, click on [nL3N1KB1Z5]

PROPOSAL REBUFFED

Much of this bloodshed could have been avoided, local political leaders told Reuters.

Naguib Sinarimbo, a Muslim leader who has negotiated between the military and Islamic separatists for years, said he and other elders had urged the armed forces to allow militias and rival Islamist groups to take the lead in ousting the Islamic State militants.

The groups were familiar with Marawi’s terrain and, through family and clan links, could influence many of the fighters to lay down their weapons, they told the armed forces.

The proposal was rebuffed, Sinarimbo said. Air power, the military assured them, was the path to a quick win.

Zia Alonto Adiong, a provincial politician, said the military also had doubts about the loyalty of some of the “political personalities” offering to provide their militias to push out the fighters.

The result was a city in ruins, hundreds of thousands of residents displaced and “emboldened” Islamists, Sinarimbo said.

“They proceeded with the aerial bombing but they didn’t take the city,” Sinarimbo said. “The military lost authority.”

In addition, the devastation of the city will play into militants’ hands, creating resentment and further radicalising many youngsters, he said.

Marawi residents in evacuation centers or staying with relatives elsewhere are becoming increasingly frustrated, said Adiong, who is a spokesman for the local government’s crisis management authority. Some residents were disappointed and angry that requests for a moratorium on bank loan repayments had not been met, he told Reuters.

Philippines central bank governor Nestor Espenilla told Reuters legislation would be needed for a debt moratorium and was being studied.

Mindanao has long been marred by the decades of Muslim hostility to rule from Manila. After years fighting insurgent groups and then long negotiations, the government signed an agreement in 2014 to give Muslim majority areas in Mindanao autonomy. But the deal has been long delayed.

“This part of the Philippines is fertile ground to plant violent extremism,” Adiong said. “There is a narrative of social injustice that is strong. Young people are fed up with the peace process and nothing concrete or sustainable has developed.”

“[The militants] use this as the basis to entice people, to get support of the local people.”

LAST STAND?

In Marawi, some in the armed forces are hopeful that at least some militants will surrender and hand over between 45 to 50 civilian captives. Carandang, the Scout Rangers captain, however said indications were the rebels are preparing for a bloody final stand.

“We are monitoring the enemy’s transmissions and it’s like during these final days they are being more fanatical,” he said. “Transmissions indicate they are preparing for suicide bombings.”

An unused suicide vest was discovered this month in Marawi’s Grand Mosque, a former stronghold of the militants, government sources told Reuters.

Suicide attacks are rare in the Philippines despite decades of Islamist insurgency.

“That’s the difference between here and Syria and Iraq,” said Ordiales, the marine general. “It’s almost the same war tactics and fighting tactics, the one thing that’s not the same is the human bomb or the suicide bombing.

“It hasn’t happened, not yet.”

(Additional reporting by Martin Petty in Marawi City and Karen Lema in Manila; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)

Russian submarine fires cruise missiles at jihadi targets in Syria

A still image taken from a video footage and released by Russia's Defence Ministry on September 22, 2017, shows a missile hitting a building which Defence Ministry said was an Islamic State target in Syria. Russian Defence Ministry/Handout via REUTERS TV

MOSCOW (Reuters) – A Russian submarine fired cruise missiles at jihadi targets in Syria’s Idlib province on Friday, the Russian Defence Ministry said, saying it had targeted Islamist militants who had tried to trap a group of Russian military policemen earlier in the week.

The strike, launched from the Mediterranean by Russia’s ‘Veliky Novgorod’ submarine, was part of a counter-offensive against a jihadi attack on government-held parts of northwest Syria near Hama on Tuesday.

The Russian Defence Ministry on Wednesday said 29 Russian military policemen had been surrounded by jihadis as a result of that attack and that Russia had been forced to break them out in a special operation backed by air power.

On Friday, it said in a statement it had fired Kalibr cruise missiles at the same jihadis from a distance of 300 kilometers (186.41 miles) striking command centers, armored vehicles and the bases of jihadis who had taken part in the original attack.

(Reporting by Polina Devitt; Editing by Andrew Osborn)

U.N. team to collect evidence of Islamic State crimes in Iraq

The United Nations Security Council meets to discuss adopting a resolution to help preserve evidence of Islamic State crimes in Iraq, during the 72nd United Nations General Assembly at U.N. Headquarters in New York, U.S., September 21, 2017.

By Michelle Nichols

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – The United Nations Security Council on Thursday approved the creation of a U.N. investigative team to collect, preserve and store evidence in Iraq of acts by Islamic State that may be war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide.

The 15-member council unanimously adopted a British-drafted resolution, after months of negotiations with Iraq, that asks Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to establish a team “to support domestic efforts” to hold the militants accountable.

Use of the evidence collected by the team in other venues, such as international courts, would “be determined in agreement with the Government of Iraq on a case by case basis.”

U.N. experts said in June last year that Islamic State was committing genocide against the Yazidis in Syria and Iraq to destroy the minority religious community through killings, sexual slavery and other crimes.

International human rights lawyer Amal Clooney and Nadia Murad, a young Yazidi woman who was enslaved and raped by Islamic State fighters in Mosul, have long pushed Iraq to allow U.N. investigators to help.

Activist Amal Clooney (R) attends a United Nations Security Council meeting set to adopt a resolution to help preserve evidence of Islamic State crimes in Iraq, during the 72nd United Nations General Assembly at U.N. Headquarters in New York, U.S., September 21, 2017. REUTERS/Brendan

Activist Amal Clooney (R) attends a United Nations Security Council meeting set to adopt a resolution to help preserve evidence of Islamic State crimes in Iraq, during the 72nd United Nations General Assembly at U.N. Headquarters in New York, U.S., September 21, 2017. REUTERS/Brendan Mcdermid

The Security Council met during the annual gathering of world leaders for the U.N. General Assembly.

Iraq’s foreign minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari officially requested international help in a letter to the Security Council last month. The council could have established an inquiry without Iraq’s consent, but Britain wanted Iraq’s approval.

Islamic State’s self-proclaimed caliphate effectively collapsed in July, when U.S.-backed Iraqi forces completed the recapture of Mosul, the militants’ capital in northern Iraq, after a nine-month campaign.

 

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; editing by Grant McCool)

 

Turkey, Iran, Iraq consider counter-measures over Kurdish referendum

Iraqi people visit Bekhal Waterfall in Erbil, Iraq September 21, 2017.

ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey, Iran and Iraq have agreed to consider counter-measures against Kurdish northern Iraq over a planned independence referendum, Turkey’s foreign ministry said on Thursday.

In a joint statement, the foreign ministers of the three countries voiced concerns that the referendum would endanger the gains Iraq has made against Islamic State, and reiterated their fears over the potential for new conflicts in the region.

“In the meeting, the three ministers emphasized that the referendum will not be beneficial for the Kurds and the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG), and agreed, in this regard, to consider taking counter-measures in coordination,” the statement said.

The statement gave no details on the possible measures but said the ministers, who were in New York attending the United Nations General Assembly, called on the international community to intervene.

Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan has threatened to impose sanctions against Kurdish northern Iraq. Turkish troops are also carrying out military exercises near the border.

The central government in Baghdad, Iraq’s neighbors and Western powers fear the vote could divide the country and spark a wider regional conflict, after Arabs and Kurds cooperated to dislodge Islamic State from its stronghold in Mosul.

The statement said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif and their Iraqi counterpart Ibrahim al-Jaafari expressed concerns that conflicts surfacing as a result of the referendum would “prove difficult to contain”.

But the Kurds say they are determined to go ahead with the vote, which, though non-binding, could trigger the process of separation in a country already divided along sectarian and ethnic lines.

The three ministers also voiced their “strong commitment” to maintain Iraq’s territorial and political unity, the foreign ministry’s statement said.

Turkey, which has pulled forward a cabinet meeting and national security council session to Friday over the referendum, will also convene parliament for an extraordinary meeting on Saturday, the chairman of the ruling AK Party’s parliamentary group said on Thursday.

 

(Reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu and Tulay Karadeniz; Editing by Dominic Evans)

 

Islamist’s lure youngsters in the Philippines with payments, promise of paradise

A teenager who fought alongside Islamic-state linked militants in Marawi City, speaks to Reuters during an interview in the southern Philippines July 11, 2017 after fleeing the fighting. REUTERS/Martin Petty

By Martin Petty

MARAWI CITY, Philippines (Reuters) – When he saw his commander holding the severed head of one of his neighbors, teenage Islamist fighter Jalil knew it was time to escape from Marawi City.

Churches and homes had been ransacked, people had been shot or taken hostage, and now Philippines government troops, planes and helicopters were pounding the Islamic State loyalists who had taken over large parts of the town on May 23.

Six days into the occupation, 17-year-old Jalil said he came across a crowd of fellow fighters led by rebel chief Abdullah Maute, including a boy who looked about 10. They were cheering the beheading of a Christian from Jalil’s neighborhood who was accused of being a spy.

“Abdullah Maute was holding a man’s head, he was shouting ‘Allahu akbar’ (God is Greatest),” said Jalil, who spoke on condition his identity was not revealed to protect him from reprisals. “They chanted with him. At that point, I realized I had to get away. I wanted no part in this.”

Jalil’s story could not be independently verified. Authorities have placed him in pinesprotective custody and say he has helped identify militants fighting in Marawi.

Jalil is one of hundreds of Muslim youths lured by Islamic State followers in Mindanao, a poverty-plagued southern island of the Philippines that governments in Southeast Asia fear could become a regional stronghold for the ultra-radical group as it loses territory in Syria and Iraq.

Rommel Banlaoi, executive director of the Philippine Institute for Peace, Violence and Terrorism Research (PIPVTR), says foreign recruiters have been active in Mindanao for years but Islamic State’s powerful propaganda and the rise of the local Maute clan of militants have brought a surge in followers.

“The recruitment is now happening very, very rapidly,” said Banlaoi, who monitors mobilization in Mindanao via informants and police interrogation reports of militants. “They’re very sophisticated. They are serious community organizers and serious recruiters.”

Schools, madrassas (Islamic schools) and even day-care centers with extremist leanings have been identified as recruiting grounds.

Authorities are working with religious teachers to keep radical ideas out of mosques and off curriculums, according to army spokesman Colonel Romeo Brawner. But provincial leaders and some military officers say the efforts are weak, partly because militants have plenty of money to reel youths into their ranks.

 

Government female soldiers wearing white hijabs and child evacuees make peace signs as part of their psychosocial activities at one of the evacuation centres in Balo-i town, Lanao Del Norte, southern Philippines, September 8, 2017. REUTERS/Romeo Ranoco

“BACK IN SERVICE”

Jalil said his involvement began when he was 11 at a mosque in Piagapo, a rustic municipality 20 km (12 miles) from Marawi, where an imam convinced him to join 40 youngsters at a training camp in return for meals and 15,000 pesos ($294) per month.

He underwent daily weapons and combat training, and teachings from the Koran. He was expelled from the program after only three months, he said, when he revealed details about his network during a mock interrogation.

Jalil heard nothing from his recruiters for six years, but the day before the Marawi siege began, there was a knock at his door. Outside was a teenager, and behind him a pickup truck with 10 other youngsters on board.

“I knew them, they were my classmates in training,” he said. “They told me ‘you’re now back in service.'”

The ubiquitous villages with tattered mosques, wooden homes and dirt-track roads carved into the jungles and mountains of Mindanao are fertile ground for recruiting unschooled youngsters and turning them into militants in camps far off the radar.

The army discovered one such training ground in Piagapo, after a three-day battle that killed 36 Maute fighters, among them foreigners and an imam. That was one month before the Marawi siege.

Reuters spoke to two teenagers from that camp, who said they were lured by promises of money, marriage and paradise after death.

They spoke on condition their full identities be withheld because authorities were not aware of their involvement, which they said ceased when the imam was killed. Their accounts could not be independently verified.

“We were trained how to evade checkpoints. We were trained how to ambush, to move silently,” said 18-year-old Abdul, who described how he and others learned to dismantle rifles, make bombs and engage in hand-to-hand combat.

Faisal, 19, said the imam held Koran classes in small jungle huts, while foreigners, whose nationalities he did not know, trained them to fight non-believers.

“The imam told us we would be rewarded with marriage to any beautiful girl we want,” he said.

The government says poor and uneducated males like Abdul and Faisal are easy prey in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), which comprises five of Mindanao’s 27 provinces.

In 2015-2016, the ARMM had the lowest secondary-school enrolment and the highest dropout rate, according to the education ministry, with just 32.4 percent of ARMM youth in school compared to the national average of 68 percent.

Nearly half of ARMM families live in poverty, under the government’s monthly income threshold of 9,064 pesos ($177), according to official data, compared to the national average of 16.5 percent. In Lanao del Sur, where Marawi is located, 66.3 percent of families live in poverty.

 

ONLINE PROFILING

But not all targets are poor, rural and uneducated.

Urban youth and students are also on the radar of recruiters who have infiltrated schools and universities and mastered social media, both to spread propaganda and to spot candidates for radicalization among Mindanao Muslims, known as Moros.

Prime targets, said Banlaoi, are those posting on social media about economic and social exclusion, or historical injustice. A hot topic is the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front’s (MILF) peace deal with the government, which promised to make ARMM a self-governing region called Bangsamoro (nation of Moros) but has been dogged by delays, breakdowns and mistrust.

Mohagher Iqbal, the MILF’s top negotiator, said extremists exploit disillusionment with the Bangsamoro plan and promote violence by teaching only selected verses of the Koran.

“We monitor them, but because the recruitment is so secretive, we cannot manage to do everything,” he told Reuters.

Banlaoi said extremists had access to technology used in the Middle East by Islamic State to track chatter on platforms like Facebook and Telegram, find suitable candidates and probe their friend networks. These recruiters included Indonesians and Malaysian militants who were “very persistent”.

The government’s fight is as much about winning hearts and minds among the Bangsamoro people as it is the battle for Marawi that has now ground on for nearly four months.

Militants try to sway public opinion with slick videos celebrating their triumph over “crusaders” they say are destroying Muslim homes and businesses in Marawi with artillery and air strikes.

The military says its focus groups have shown some displaced Marawi children “idolise” the militants. It has sent female soldiers to counsel children in evacuation camps and identify those already radicalized.

Jalil, the teen fighter said he was at first inspired by the rousing speeches of Abdullah Maute and his brother, Omarkhayam. But he was appalled by the bloodletting that ensued.

“I can’t forget what I saw. Every street corner there were dead bodies, Christians and Muslims,” he said.

On the night of the execution he witnesses, Jalil abandoned his post guarding a bridge and rode a motorcycle for 50 km (31 miles) to evade army checkpoints. He turned himself in to police two weeks later.

A former military intelligence officer who has tracked the Maute clan said the military under-estimated them as a “ragtag group”. But the Mautes have demonstrated a capacity to regroup and, thanks to deep pockets and the respect they command among local youth, would probably strengthen after Marawi is retaken by “filling vacancies” left by hundreds of dead fighters.

The worst-case scenario, the officer said, was if the Maute brothers survive. “Recruitment will be massive,” he said. “There are lots of students idolizing them.”

 

(Additional reporting by Tom Allard in MARAWI CITY and Neil Jerome Morales in MANILA; Editing by John Chalmers and Raju Gopalakrishnan)

 

Trial opens for American in Islamic State-linked police beheading plot

By Scott Malone

BOSTON (Reuters) – A Massachusetts man charged with plotting to behead police officers in an effort to help Islamic State was due in court on Wednesday for the start of his trial on charges including conspiracy to commit acts of terrorism.

Federal prosecutors charge that the man, David Daoud Wright, along with his uncle and a friend, had first plotted to kill the woman who organized a 2015 “Draw Mohammed” contest in Garland, Texas. But they contend Wright’s uncle, Usamaah Abdullah Rahim, lost patience and in June 2015 told Wright and the third man that he instead planned to kill police officers.

Law enforcement had been monitoring communications between the three and overheard the threat, prosecutors said. When police approached Rahim in a Boston supermarket parking lot to question him, he drew a large knife and officers shot him dead.

Police later arrested Wright, who lived in the Boston suburb of Everett, and a third conspirator, Nicholas Rovinski. Wright has denied all wrongdoing. Rovinski last year pleaded guilty to two criminal counts of conspiracy to provide material support to a terrorist organization.

If Wright is found guilty of the charge of conspiracy to commit acts of terrorism transcending national boundaries, he could face a life sentence. He is also charged with conspiracy to support a terrorist organization and obstruction of justice, allegedly for telling Rahim to destroy his phone before attacking police, as well as for attempting to destroy all information on his computer.

Prosecutors said the men initially wanted to behead New York resident Pamela Geller, who had organized the Texas event in May highlighting cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad, images that many Muslims consider blasphemous. Two gunmen had attacked that event, and were shot dead by police.

Geller contends her event was intended as a demonstration of the free-speech rights protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Rahim’s family have denied he had shown any signs of radicalization.

(Reporting by Scott Malone; Editing by Tom Brown)

British police arrest second man over London train bomb

The scene where a man was arrested in connection with an explosion on Parsons Green Tube station, in Hounslow, London, Britain, September 18, 2017. REUTERS/Peter Nicholls

By Paul Sandle

LONDON (Reuters) – British police arrested a second man over the bombing of a London commuter train on Friday that injured 30 people and the security services lowered the threat level for an attack from its highest setting.

The 21-year-old man was detained under Britain’s terrorism laws in the west London suburb of Hounslow just before midnight on Saturday, London police said in a statement.

Police earlier arrested an 18-year-old man in the departure lounge of Dover port in what they called a “significant” step and then raided a property in Sunbury-on-Thames, a town near London and about four miles (six km) from Hounslow.

The home-made bomb shot flames through a packed carriage at west London’s Parsons Green Tube station during the Friday morning rush hour but apparently failed to detonate fully.

Islamic State claimed responsibility, as it has for other attacks in Britain this year, including two in London and one at a concert by American singer Ariana Grande in Manchester in May.

Interior minister Amber Rudd said on Sunday the second arrest showed it was not a lone-wolf attack but there was no evidence Islamic State was involved.

She said the threat level had been lowered to “severe” from “critical”, meaning another attack was highly likely rather than expected imminently.

“It is inevitable that so-called Islamic State, or Daesh, will reach in and try to claim responsibility. We have no evidence to suggest that yet,” Rudd told the BBC.

“But as this unfolds, and as the police do their investigations, we will make sure that we find out exactly how he was radicalized, if we can.”

 

HOUSE SEARCHES

Police said on Sunday they were searching a home in Stanwell in the county of Surrey near the perimeter of London’s Heathrow Airport, in connection with the Hounslow arrest.

Police continued to search the house in Sunbury nearby but said there were no safety risks to local residents.

Local media said the home belongs to a couple who have fostered hundreds of children, including refugees. The BBC said the couple, 88-year-old Ronald Jones and Penelope Jones, 71, had been honored by Queen Elizabeth for their work with children.

The bomb struck as passengers were traveling toward the center of the British capital. Some suffered burns and others were hurt in a stampede to escape. Health officials said none was thought to be in a serious condition.

Prime Minister Theresa May put Britain on its highest security level late on Friday and soldiers and armed police were deployed to strategic locations such as nuclear power plants.

On Saturday, armed police patrolled the streets near government departments in Westminster and guarded Premier League soccer grounds hosting matches.

The last time Britain was put on “critical” alert was after a suicide bomber killed 22 people at the Ariana Grande concert.

On that occasion, the threat level remained at critical for four days while police established whether the bomber had worked alone or with others. Prior to that it had not been triggered since 2007.

 

(Additional reporting by Andrew Heavens; editing by David Clarke)