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Debris seen inside a church attacked by two suicide bombers in Sulu, Philippines, on January 27, 2019. Photo: EPA-EFE
This Week in AsiaPolitics

Isis terror tactics being exported to Southeast Asia, US official says

  • Isis fighters are not going to Southeast Asia en masse, but the US has seen a rise of Isis-inspired plans, including suicide bombings, in the region
  • Counterterrorism official Nathan Sales says Washington will target the various flows of terror financing to curb the efforts of terrorists in Southeast Asia
Islamic militancy
Amy Chew
Amy Chew
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Islamic State militants are not heading to Southeast Asia “in droves” following the fall of the Caliphate even though the terror group has been encouraging its fighters in Syria to take the fight to other regions, according to the US State Department’s top counterterrorism official.

“We have seen a few indications of an interest in travelling to Southeast Asia, but truth be told, it’s not one of the regions that Isis fighters seem to be heading to in droves,” Nathan Sales told a press briefing in Manila on Friday.

“So far we haven’t seen a huge problem, but we have to make sure we keep it that way,” Sales said. He added that the United States was working with the Philippines to boost cooperation on border security, to prevent people from exploiting the maritime environment to gain access to countries in the region.
However Sales did warn that terrorist tactics from the Middle East, including suicide bombings, were being exported to Southeast Asia via local chapters, or inspiring copycat behaviour from regional groups.
“Increasingly, we are seeing terrorist groups such as Isis [and] al-Qaeda come to rely on regional networks and affiliates around the globe,” Sales said.

“Suicide bombing is not something that we’ve seen in … Southeast Asia until very, very recently, and we are concerned about groups like Isis and sympathisers of Isis emulating what they see in places like Syria and Afghanistan,” he said.

Debris seen inside a church attacked by two suicide bombers in Sulu, Philippines, on January 27, 2019. Photo: EPA-EFE
Former militants have said that Mindanao, in southern Philippines, is the only place Isis could set up a wilayat, or province, as the island is awash with weapons, suffers from porous borders and has swathes of poorly-governed space.
In the 1990s, a paramilitary training camp for al-Qaeda’s Southeast Asia branch, the Jemaah Islamiah (JI) group, was held in Mindanao, where members learnt to assemble bombs and use firearms before returning to Indonesia to launch attacks, including the 2002 Bali bombings that killed 202 people.

“Mindanao is the closest jihad zone for Malaysian and Indonesians and the most economically viable for them to travel to,” said Nasir Abas, a former JI leader who established the Mindanao training camp called Camp Hudaibiyah.

Philippine soldiers walk past battle-scarred buildings in what was the main combat area of Marawi, Mindanao, on October 17, 2017. Photo: AFP

According to Nasir, “Malaysian and Indonesian militants” were attracted to go to Mindanao, but “not Arabs”. An Indonesian counter-terrorism source said around 15-20 Indonesian militants are in Mindanao.

This was because Arab fighters “want to launch large-scale attacks”, but the Isis affiliates “are smaller than MILF and MNLF”, he said, referring to the two biggest armed groups in Mindanao, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and the Moro National Liberation Front. Both MILF and MNLF have signed peace agreements with the Philippine government.

In 2017, Mindanao was the site of the biggest attack by Isis affiliates, the Maute Group and Abu Sayyaf Group, which seized control of Marawi city for five months before falling to government troops.

More than 1,000 people died in the fighting. It was the most serious assault in Isis’ effort to gain a foothold in Southeast Asia, unsettling governments across the region.

Members of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF) seen in Zamboanga city, southern Philippines, on November 28, 2001. Photo: AP

In July this year, Philippine security officials said at least seven foreign terrorists were training local militants for suicide attacks in Mindanao, and there could possibly be dozens more.

“They are doing the usual. They are training bombers, grooming suicide bombers, as manifested by the recent incident,” Lieutenant-General Cirilito Sobejana, head of the military’s Western Mindanao Command, was quoted as saying by local press. “They are also training [Filipinos] on other terrorist actions.”

Baghdadi’s dead, but Islamic State’s ideology lives on in Southeast Asia

Sales said there was a need to clamp down on the various flows of terror financing to stop extremist groups from travelling and moving their fighters, money and weapons into the region.

“When we put terrorist organisations on our sanctions list, that cuts off the flow of money that these groups, that these individuals can use,” Sales said.

“Terrorists seek to raise money through a number of different means: narcotics trafficking, human smuggling, as well as seemingly licit enterprises – front companies for terrorism.”

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: Isis terror tactics being exported to region, US warns
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