A glaring inadequacy in current public discussion or ‘discourse’ on the issues growing out of the Easter Sunday terror attacks is the almost lop-sided stress on short-term security measures as answers to these complex posers. Immediate security measures to protect the public are urgently needed and the Sri Lankan state is providing these requirements adequately but discussion on these questions needs to go well beyond this dimension in the country’s present affairs.
As has been pointed out in this column frequently, long term security and protection of life and limb needs to be addressed in an informed fashion and a discussion on inter-communal reconciliation too is needed if we are to arrive at comprehensive solutions to the country’s current needs. Reconciliation is an arduous, complex undertaking but minus this requirement we would be having only half measures to ethnic and religion-related, implosive violence.
Seen from this point of view, a lecture delivered on Wednesday in Colombo by former US ambassador to Sri Lanka Robert O. Blake Jr titled, ‘Update from Washington: US Foreign Policy Towards China and South Asia and What it Means for Sri Lanka’, proved thought-provoking, comprehensive and instructive. The lecture was organised by the Pathfinder Foundation in partnership with the Joint Apparel Association Forum Sri Lanka and was held at the BMICH. Blake is at present the chairman of the Board of the US-Indonesia Society and a member of the Board of the Asia Foundation besides being Senior Director at the India & South Asia arm of McLarty Associates.
For the majority of listener’s in Blake’s audience short term security or law-and-order measures, very understandably, would have been of the prime importance. The speaker dealt very amply with this dimension to the country’s current issues with his stressing the need for a rigorous, impartial and fair probe into the Easter attacks by the Lankan authorities. They need to find out the wrong doers and bring them to book. The country needs to find out how the tragedy came about and how the terrorists escaped detection for so long. Besides, how did they come to acquire Rs. 7 billion in assets and money?
Besides focusing on these law and order questions, Blake also pointed to how closely coordinated operations by Sri Lanka’s intelligence and defence authorities from now on could prevent future terror attacks in this country. On this score Sri Lanka could have, and is already having, the cooperation of US security and intelligence agencies, such as the FBI. Such cooperation would continue.
Blake made a crucial observation when he pointed out to how close coordination among the US’ intelligence and security agencies has prevented external terror attacks on the US since 9/11. What Sri Lanka should take from this is obvious.
Accordingly, the most essential law and order measures needed to strengthen local security in the short and medium terms were outlined along with an update on the military cooperation measures currently taken by the US with its allies in Asia, such as Sri Lanka.
Besides strengthening the internal security of states in the Asia-Pacific, it was pointed out by the speaker that such measures also served some of the most vital foreign policy requirements of the US in consideration of the emergence of China as a major Asia-Pacific economic and military power.
On this score, Blake dealt with a range of issues pertaining to current US-China relations. One of the most important observations was that China’s ‘Belt and Road’ initiative was basically a strategic project that intended to link the markets of the world with Beijing. It has prompted the US to rename its Pacific Command, the Indo-Pacific Command. This fleet would enable the US to have a presence from the East Coast of Africa to the West Coast of the US, besides yielding other strategic benefits.
However, China’s ‘Belt and Road’ project has also prompted the US to launch a number of counter-measures in the economic field of almost the same kind, such as the launching of the International Finance Corporation with its major allies. Essentially, the US is not intending to look the other way as China grows as a major global power.
One of the most important parts of Blake’s presentation took the form of his outlining of religious and ethnic reconciliation measures. These should be seen as complementing the law and order requirements which were detailed earlier. Without these measures stability and peace for the ordinary citizen cannot be seen as being sealed.
As this is being written, an outburst of fighting between Syrian government forces and a group of resistance fighters has claimed some 45 lives in north-west Syria. This is a disquieting reminder that law and order measures could be effective only in the short term. Without reconciliation among warring groups we cannot have enduring peace. There is a lesson here for big powers such as the US and Russia. Military means alone cannot and would not deliver peace. Moreover, the big powers should awaken to the fact that the Taliban has made a come back in Afghanistan. The security approach should be seen as highly inadequate in view of these developments.
However, Blake gave his audience some valuable pointers on how peace-building could be proceeded with. For instance, religious leaders from all communities concerned need to come together to launch conflict avoidance and resolution measures. This was successfully worked out in Indonesia where after a bout of religious turmoil some years back religious leaders worked out ‘early warning’ signals, for example, that could defuse inter-religious tensions before they degenerated into full scale rioting.
Basically, it could be inferred that the dignity of ‘the Other’ had to be recognized by antagonists. This columnist cannot help but observe that this is the glaring lacuna in Sri Lanka’s so-called reconciliation and peace efforts. Blake was of the view that one of the aims of the Easter attackers was to irreconcilably antagonise the Christians against the Moslems. Needless to say, only growing amicability between these groups could stave off this tragedy. Consequently, bridge-building among communities is the most enduring path to peace.
Now look at this
news item copied below and read it with comments on it
Vow another
Rs.3.5 billion of public funds down the drain for the benefit of politicians
and rogues.
Don’t they have
more important issues to decide on at a critical time of the nation like this?
Is it not a
parallel to the appointment of Arjun Mahendran a non-citizen as Governor of the
Central Bank through whom the Ranil robbed the nation’s premier Bank and
destroyed the nation’s economy?
To whom are
these tabs, when all schools are closed
Why tabs when
most of our schools don’t have even a tap.
Is it the crying
need of our schools while there are other burning issues like lack of basic
requirements like buildings, teachers, books, desks, toilets, discipline and
even proper curricula and teaching
Is it justified
to have a fool like this who has no brain even to understand this much as the
Minister of education in a country?
Does he at least
know that none of these children who are given tablets have a vote?
Shouldn’t this
type of politicians be publicly hanged to save the count before they make it
irreversible?
Why didn’t he
reject this meekly as he did to the Cabinet paper submitted by Sagala
Ratnayaka. I don’t think he has learned any lesson from the CB scam where he
objected first but gave in later.
Is this a
Cabinet in charge of good Governance of a country or a veritable CABI-NUT, a
cabal of nuts, composed of a bunch of rogues and highway robbers that destroy
the motherland that has nursed them?
In my view all
Cabinet decisions in a country should be taken for the good of the country and
the people and not for the personal benefits and survival of politicians.
But today, in
this country, almost all Cabinet decisions are always driven by personal
benefits to politicians and their survival
I think the time has come now for the people to get
down to the streets demanding the immediate resignation of this Government
The news item
Akila wins cabinet approval for Rs. 3.5 bn tab project
8 May 2019 07:02
am – 9 – 1021
Education
Minister Akila Viraj Kariyawasam secured Cabinet approval for the free
distribution of 183,000 tabs among school children despite objection by
President Maithripala Sirisena.
The project will
cost Rs.3.5 billion.
The President,
from the beginning, held the view that a pilot project should be implemented
first on the distribution of electronic tablets. He had opined that a final
decision could be taken subject to the results of the pilot project.
The matter came
up for discussion at the Cabinet meeting yesterday. A committee, appointed to
look into the programme, also supported the free distribution tabs. Finally,
the President gave in, enabling the Minister to get approval to proceed with
the programme.
Besides,
President Maithripala Sirisena had yet another spat with Prime Minister Ranil
Wickremesinghe by objecting a Cabinet proposal to increase some Port tariffs,
the Daily Mirror learns.
Minister of
Ports and Shipping Sagala Ratnayake submitted a Cabinet paper seeking approval
for tariff hikes.
However, the
President flatly rejected the proposal. It led to arguments between the
President and the Prime Minister.(Kelum Bandara)
Comments – 9
Athukorala Wednesday, 08 May 2019 07:54 AM
WOW !!! Yeah… that’s ALL what we needed
at this very moment… A Tab…!
Ravi Wednesday, 08 May 2019 08:21 AM
How much your
getting as commission, did they approve that as well.
suresh Wednesday, 08 May 2019 08:23 AM
Is this really
what is needed for most schools in the country?
Shan Wednesday, 08 May 2019 08:24 AM
Another unwise
decision at a time the needs are different. Will the Tabs provide security to
school students?
Dallas Wednesday, 08 May 2019 08:35 AM
Waste of money
can not believe how out of touch this UNP government is Is this our biggest
problem in the country, spend on something important UNP will struggle to get
25% in next election if they contest alone
Ice Wednesday, 08 May 2019 08:46 AM
Utter waste of
money! Is that the way you planning to win elections?
Tanto Wednesday, 08 May 2019 08:47 AM
Today the
Internet is the primary source of information around the world. This is the
correct thing to do. These can not be understood by Gamaralas.
citizen Wednesday, 08 May 2019 08:51 AM
ol’ Siri seem to
be showing some rare common sense
Naushki Fareez Wednesday, 08 May 2019 09:07 AM
Rs.3.5 billion –
This is not relevant at this hour. Increase security in Schools….! We will
give our votes then…!
On 4th May, 2019, H.E. Cheng Xueyuan, the Ambassador of China to Sri Lanka presented a cheque for Rs. 17.84m to Mr. Nimal Kumar, National Secretary of the Sri Lanka Red Cross Society(SLRCS) on behalf of the Red Cross Society of China. The donation will be specially used in the treatment of the injured in the Easter Sunday attacks.
Ambassador Cheng reaffirmed that at the time of sorrow, Chinese government and people stand firmly with the Sri Lankan people and resolutely support Sri Lanka in safeguarding its national security and stability, and building a peaceful and prosperous country. Chinese government is intensively negotiating with Sri Lankan side and will provide all necessary assistance within its capacity according to the urgent requests extended by Sri Lanka.
Mr. Nimal Kumar briefed about the SLRCS’ work after the bomb blasts, highly appreciated the Red Cross Society of China for its helping hand in a difficult time of Sri Lanka, and promised to use all the donation in the treatment of the injured.
Sam Harris, the host of the podcast Making Sense, and author of books such as Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion. Courtesy Sam Harris
For the better part of two decades, philosopher and neuroscientist Sam Harris has been a popular — and controversial — critic of organized religion, and in particular Islam. In a new episode of Recode Decode with Kara Swisher, he said that although he disavows anyone in his audience who would use his work as justification for bigotry, he still believes that we need to have a tough conversation about violent jihadism and a culture of acceptance” from regular Muslims.
Islam has problems and points of conflict with modernity and secular culture and civil society, and a value like free speech that Mormonism doesn’t have, or the Anglican Communion doesn’t have, or Scientology,” Harris said, adding, All the beliefs around martyrdom explain the character of Muslim violence we’re seeing throughout the world. And if they had different doctrines, they would behave differently.
And I’m not talking about all Muslims, I’m talking about the power of specific ideas on a subset of adherents to Islam — and how big that subset is is open for debate,” he added. It’s not as small as we would like. It’s not as big as right-wing nutcases fear, but it’s big enough to be of significant consequence such for the rest of our lives, we are going to be talking about this problem.”
The cases that worry me the most are the cases where you have an ideology that’s so powerful and captivating that totally normal people, without real terrestrial grievances, can be inducted into it and do the unthinkable because of simply what they believe,” he said. White supremacy is an ideology, I’ll grant you. It doesn’t link up with so many good things in a person’s life that it is attracting psychologically normal non-beleaguered people into its fold.
In reality, white supremacy, and certainly murderous white supremacy, is the fringe of the fringe in our society and any society,” Harris added. And if you’re gonna link it up with Christianity, it is the fringe of the fringe of Christianity … You cannot remotely say any of those things about jihadism and Islam.”
The new episode is a wide-ranging conversation that also touches on — among other topics — why Harris rejects the idea of identity politics; why he also rejects and denounces President Trump; and whether Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey should shut the whole service down and declare it a wash.
Ten-year-old Ashayal Rosairo was injured in an attack on the Zion church in Batticaloa, Sri Lanka (Picture: Allison Joyce/Getty Images)
Attacks on Christians – like those on churches in Sri Lanka over Easter – demonstrate that Isis fighters are against Islam, writes Dr Azeem Ibrahim.
The Easter attacks against Christians in Sri Lanka by a group who swore allegiance to Isis were carried out in the name of Islam. This is nothing new, back when Isis was still expanding into the multi-ethnic and religiously diverse northern Iraq, not just Yazidis but also the country’s one million Christians were some of their main targets. They were asked to either convert or leave. Otherwise they would be killed. All along, churches were being bombed or burnt to the ground.
Most of the Christians who used to inhabit those areas of the Levant where Isis took control were displaced, in an act of religious/ethnic cleansing more thorough than any that Saddam Hussein ever achieved. To Isis, destroying churches and killing Christianswas secondary only to their top priority of killing other ‘apostate’ Muslims – Shia Muslims in particular.
Muslim scholars have stated that such actions are completely un-Islamic, strictly against Sharia and a blasphemy against the Prophet Muhammad more serious than any they can think of from history. The Qur’an commands Muslims to follow Muhammad and his example: O you who believe! Obey God and obey the Messenger” (4:59)
This and dozens of other verses in the Qur’an compel Muslims to obey Muhammad. And this is why Sharia law is based not just on the Qur’an, but also on the Sunnah, the words, the life and the practices of the Prophet. And the Prophet Mohammad was very clear about how Muslims should treat Christians. He entered into a treaty with them which deserves to be quoted in full here.
The Prophet issued the following declaration in 628 CE: This is a message from Muhammad ibn Abdullah, as a covenant to those who adopt Christianity, near and far, we are with them.
Verily I, the servants, the helpers, and my followers defend them, because Christians are my citizens; and by God! I hold out against anything that displeases them.
No compulsion is to be on them. Neither are their judges to be removed from their jobs nor their monks from their monasteries. No one is to destroy a house of their religion, to damage it, or to carry anything from it to the Muslims’ houses. Should anyone take any of these, he would spoil God’s covenant and disobey His Prophet. Verily, they are my allies and have my secure charter against all that they hate.
No one is to force them to travel or to oblige them to fight. The Muslims are to fight for them. If a female Christian is married to a Muslim, it is not to take place without her approval. She is not to be prevented from visiting her church to pray. Their churches are to be respected. They are neither to be prevented from repairing them nor the sacredness of their covenants.
No one of the nation (Muslims) is to disobey the covenant till the Last Day (end of the world).”
This Patent was given by the Prophet Muhammad in Medina to a delegation of Christian monks from St Catherine’s Monastery at Mount Sinai. The Patent was signed with the Prophetic seal. READ MORE: Sri Lanka explosions: At least 8 Britons among 290 victims
The original was moved from St Catherine’s monastery by Sultan Selim I of the Ottoman Empire in 1517, and today can be seen in the Topkapi Museum in Istanbul. When he took the document from the monastery, the Sultan and Caliph of Islam Selim renewed its terms and gave the resident monks in Sinai a copy. This copy is still at the monastery. Any Muslim can go see either of these documents with their own eyes whenever they wish to do so.
The Prophet granted unconditional protection and what today we would recognise as basic human rights to Christians, near and far. All true Caliphs since then have observed this treaty, as they have been compelled to do till the Last Day – ie this treaty can not be abrogated. There are few things in the Sharia that can be as clear as this prescription towards Christians.
But today, Wahhabi clerics and Isis fanatics seem to think that they know better than the Prophet himself how to be good Muslims. And that now includes destroying all churches, in direct violation of God’s covenant. Wahhabis say they want to emulate the life and times of the Prophet. Isis and their Caliph” want to rebuild the original Caliphate to represent the entire ummah. So why are their teachings and their actions then exactly opposed to those of the very first Islamic state of Muhammad in Medina (CE 622)?
When the Muslim community world-wide came out to condemn the Sri Lanka attacks, they did not do so in the name of political correctness” or out of fear of reprisals. They did so because this Isis cell violated the Prophet’s covenant in their name. For even the most fundamentalist Muslim who actually knows their Qur’an, Hadith and Sharia, this was an attack against the honour and authority of the Prophet just as much as it was an attack against Christians on their holiest day of the year.
If the Prophet Muhammad is not your guide to God, then you are not a Muslim. By violating the Prophet’s irrevocable covenant, the Sri Lanka attackers declared themselves against Islam. By the very ideology they claim to represent, they are the Apostates.
Two weeks after Sri Lanka witnessed terror bombings and the launch of police and army searches, hundreds of bullets, military uniforms, and swords are still being discovered in various parts of the country.
New Delhi (Sputnik) — A retired army man with nearly 1,000 rounds of live ammunition in Sri Lanka’s Nawagamuwa area was arrested on Wednesday while transporting bullets.
Police said that the suspect was carrying 205 rounds of T56 ammo, 640 rounds of 9mm ammo, 40 T56 training rounds, two T56 magazines, one 9mm magazine, and one air rifle.
Police have also found nearly 50 swords, a small gun and several other suspicious items in a public well near a mosque located close to the Premdasa International Cricket Stadium in Colombo.
Earlier on Tuesday, police arrested two individuals with 1,116 military uniforms (camouflage) in Seeduwa during a search operation. The fatigues, resembling Air Force uniforms, were discovered when a lorry in the Raddolugama area was inspected.
Fresh discoveries are being made amid searches being conducted across the country after serial blasts left 253 killed and over 500 others injured. In a special statement in the parliament on Tuesday, Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe cautionedpeople, saying that although normalcy had returned, the country will not be free of global terrorism.
The tragic Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka were a surprise and a revelation to both Sri Lankans and the world at large.
For many outside the country it was a surprise that Sri Lanka even had a Muslim population. For those in Sri Lanka, it was a revelation that local Muslims would target Christian churches when there had been no domestic history of tensions between the two religions – both of which have followers from many different ethnic communities within the country.
Quite apart from the trauma and distress caused to those innocents who were killed or injured, their families and friends, the bombings have had an immediate impact on the tourist industry, which accounts for around 5% of Sri Lanka’s GDP of around $84bn (€75bn).
Countries including the US, UK, China and Australia – whose citizens account for a substantial proportion of the roughly 2m tourists that visited Sri Lanka last year – have issued travel warnings recommending citizens stay away for all but essential travel.
The situation is grievous, but the country has seen worse: it is still in the process of recovering from decades of civil war. The conflict between the Tamil Tigers and the government during the 1990s and 2000s culminated in the defeat of the Tigers in 2009, but the memories are still fresh and raw.
There were also two communist-inspired uprisings against the government in 1971 and 1987-89, which also led to the deaths of thousands. Yet in all these conflicts, foreigners and Christians were never explicitly targeted. That is in contrast to the Easter Sunday bombings, aimed at a mixture of high-end hotels frequented by foreigners, and local Christian churches.
The bombings represent something inspired from outside the country, namely radical Islam in the form of ISIS – even if it was undertaken by locals. That is a relief for Sri Lanka, since it is likely that the bombings are not the precursor to another civil war, any more than the attacks in Paris in 2015, or in Manchester and London in 2017, were in France and the UK. This suggests that travel warnings, while necessary in the immediate aftermath, should be able to be relaxed within a relatively short time.
What was most galling for Sri Lanka was the subsequent reports of incompetence and negligence of the divided government that allowed the bombings to go ahead, despite repeated warnings.
With presidential elections due to be held later this year, the chaos has political ramifications: Gotabaya Rajapaksa, the former defence minister under his brother, president Mahinda Rajapaksa, was responsible for defeating the Tamil Tigers in a bloody climax that resulted in the deaths of thousands of civilians. He is accused of war crimes, but has used his ‘strong man’ image to announce a campaign for president, claiming he will stop the spread of Islamist extremism by rebuilding the intelligence services.
While the bombings may have no long-term implications for Sri Lanka – apart from contributing to a more volatile atmosphere ahead of the presidential elections – they do have much more serious global implications.
There is no doubt there will be more terrorist attacks linked to radical Islam, but they are unlikely to be in Sri Lanka. They could be anywhere else in the world where radical Islamic influences have been ignored and allowed to flourish.
The more worrying danger may be just across the Palk Strait in India, with evidence that some of the Sri Lanka bombers had been indoctrinated and trained there – although at least its intelligence services were more competent than their Sri Lankan equivalents, according to reports.
The House of Islam is on fire – and the arsonist still lives there,” declares Ed Husain in his book The House of Islam: A Global History – a reference to the violence of Salafi-jihadis who, in the earliest days of Islam, were known as Kharijites, or outsiders.
They were, Husain says, declared to be non-Muslims by Muslim scholars. Yet it is the rise of that philosophy across the globe that is fuelling Islamic extremism. As Husain points out, Salafi-Wahhabism is the prevailing Islamic movement in Saudi Arabia today, yet represents less than 5% of the world’s Muslims. The reason it has become such a potent force is that Saudi Arabia has spent an estimated $200bn of its oil wealth in recent decades strenuously propagating its hard-line theology around the globe.
The 1749 alliance between the Saudi royal family and Wahhabi clerics must be nullified,” argues Husain. For Sri Lankans, the evidence of that relationship is all too clear, as novelist Ameena Hussein wrote earlier this month in the New York Times.
It is not travelling to Sri Lanka that we need to be worried about, but rather how to stem the growth of a violent creed that has distorted Islam. Husain declares that we need to cleanse our mosques, publishing houses, schools, websites, satellite TV stations, madrasas and ministries of Salafi-jihadi influences”. That is a generational struggle, yet it needs to be done even if it causes a rift with Saudi Arabia.
Shia Iran may be a pariah nation to the US at least, but it is a hard-line Sunni Islamic nation, supposedly an ally of the West, whose wealth has propagated a terrorist philosophy that the world struggles to contain.
Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena, who has vowed to restructure the security system of the terror-hit country, has said that 13 safe-houses and 41 bank accounts owned by terrorists responsible for the 21 April serial blasts have been identified.
New Delhi (Sputnik): Out of the 56 suspects held for the 21 April Sri Lankan bombings, at least 12 are hard-core terrorists, Sri Lankan President Mathripala Sirisena has said, adding that the situation in his island nation remains serious.
“Of the 56 suspects who currently remain in custody over their direct involvement, 12 are hardcore terrorists. 13 safe houses used by them have been discovered… This is, in my view, a serious situation”, President Maithripala Sirisena said while addressing lawmakers in parliament on Tuesday.
Authorities will soon confiscate the accounts, houses, and properties belonging to them, he added.
Earlier in the day, Sri Lanka Army chief Mahesh Senanayake gave a clarion call to the general public to return to their normal lives, assuring them that the tri-forces and the police were dedicated to their safety throughout day and night.
“After the terror attacks that occurred on April 21 and as of now, the Sri Lanka Army, other security forces and the police have implemented strategic plans to ensure the security”, Senanayake said, while addressing media at the Ministry of Defence.
Meanwhile, searches across the country were underway to find suspects. Police have discovered a cache of anti-aircraft bullets in the Alagalla area in Vavuniya on Monday evening, while six casings used for mortar shells were also recovered from a nearby area.
In the last three days till Monday, the police also discovered two large militant training camps said to be linked to the deadly 21 April Easter Sunday terror attacks against churches and hotels that claimed 253 lives and injured over 500 others.
COLOMBO (AFP) – A US official wounded in Sri Lanka’s Easter Sunday suicide bombings has died in hospital, raising the total number killed to 258, including 45 foreigners, officials said on Wednesday (May 8).
“We pay tribute to Chelsea – and all those lost and injured – by partnering with Sri Lanka and nations worldwide to bring unity in the face of terrorism,” Ms Teplitz said.
Ms Decaminada, a graduate of Duke University, worked for the US Commerce Department and was on assignment in Sri Lanka when she was caught in the bombings, claimed by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) group and attributed to a local radical cell called National Thowheeth Jama’ath.
The bombers targeted three luxury hotels and three Christian churches. Nearly 500 people were wounded in the attacks, the worst single-day bombing against civilians in the Indian Ocean island.
Officials said Ms Decaminada was airlifted to Singapore for treatment, but she died from her injuries over the weekend.
“As we mourn her loss, we must continue to fight terrorism around the world,” US Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in a statement.Related Story
The Sri Lankan Foreign Ministry had previously said 44 foreign nationals died in the attacks, while another 10 are still unaccounted for.
Sri Lankan authorities say they have arrested or killed all the Islamists responsible for the April 21 suicide bombings, but the island still faces the threat of “global terrorism”, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said on Tuesday.
BY:Robin Wright Courtesy United States Institute of Peace
Defeating the Islamic State means determining the future for tens of thousands of ex-fighters and their families.
After losing its last territory in Syria on March 23, 2019, the Islamic State quickly reclaimed global attention with the Easter bombings in Sri Lanka on April 21 and a video tape of its reclusive leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, on April 29. The jihadi movement is now shifting focus to its ISIS branches, or provinces,” in Africa, Asia and Europe. Baghdadi signaled ISIS’s expansion by formally embracing two Sunni extremist groups in Mali and Burkina Faso. But the Islamic State’s human core—more than 100,000 fighters and their families, including children—remains clustered in the rubble of its former caliphate” in both Syria and Iraq. In Syria, they are detained in makeshift prisons, a hospital and refugee-style camps in the desert of northeastern Syria. USIP Senior Fellow Robin Wright made a rare tour of northeastern Syria to interview men and women who were part of the ISIS caliphate and to assess the risks posed by the post-caliphate crisis.
As the Islamic State caliphate” collapsed in March, women and children of ISIS fighters’ families were gathered at a rudimentary detention camp in al-Hol. The camp now holds more than 70,000. (Photo credit: Robin Wright/USIP)
What’s the big picture in the former ISIS caliphate?
The world faces the most complex post-war challenge in decades in dealing with the dregs of the Islamic State—physically, politically and psychologically. No one had correctly estimated the tens of thousands who eventually surrendered or were captured as the caliphate collapsed. The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the U.S.-backed militia that fought ISIS, took some 9,000 prisoners. Around 2,000 are foreign fighters from dozens of countries, ranging from the United States to Russia, Tunisia to China and Morocco to the Maldives.
The Syrian Democratic Forces had to create pop-up prisons”— converting an unused school, an oil storage facility and other small compounds—to hold all the fighters. The prison I visited at Dashisha was crude and understaffed. It was filled with 1,500 fighters in four days. Each cell contained more than two dozen men crushed together and sitting on the floor. I visited a local hospital at al-Shaddadi [south of al-Hasakah] that had to take in hundreds of badly injured ISIS fighters. The Syrian and Iraqi fighters were six to a room; the foreign fighters were crammed into the basement. The main basement room had close to 70 men lying on mats; the stench from infections was overwhelming. The Syrian Democratic Forces were paying for their food and care by reducing the pay of their own soldiers. For the SDF, neither the prisons nor the hospital are sustainable without more international help and collaboration in figuring out the future of these men.
One issue now is what to do with the prisoners. The SDF is a militia, not a state. It does not have the expertise, facilities, resources or staff to cope with so many men indefinitely. Many governments do not want to take back their citizens for several reasons: There is scant evidence of what crimes each fighter committed as the basis for charging or trying them. Some countries are even wary of jailing the ISIS fighters for fear they might infect the prison population with their ideology. Iraq has pledged to take back its 31,000 citizens—fighters and families—but it is already struggling to cope with more than 20,000 members of ISIS in Iraq.
What about the rest of the ISIS population?
After the fall of the Islamic State’s capital in Raqqa, in October 2017, ISIS fighters and their families fled down the Euphrates River—from town to town—until they reached Baghouz on the border with Iraq. The final battle for Baghouz began in early 2019. But neither the U.S.-led coalition nor the SDF grasped the numbers of civilians who had ended up in the farming hamlet. Besides the fighters, another 74,000 family members, mainly women and children, surrendered and were transferred to a detainee camp in al-Hol. Of those, 65 percent were under the age of 18; 23 percent were under the age of five. Some of the wives of fighters boasted that they are breeding the next generation of ISIS militants for the next caliphate.
The problem of what to do with ISIS families is also daunting. Many governments do not want them to return home since they would be free unless charged with crimes. Others come from countries, such as Libya and Yemen, that are basically failed states and have few mechanisms to cope with them. Some families do not want to return to their countries of origin—notably the Uighurs of China and the Chechens of Russia–because they are members of persecuted minorities. The secondary issue is how to deradicalize them after up to five years of living under the Islamic State and embracing its beliefs and practices. A few countries—Kazakhstan, Morocco and Oman—have taken a few of their citizens, but most Western governments, including many that were members of the U.S.-led coalition of more than 70 countries, have been reluctant to absorb either fighters or their families. The aftermath of the Islamic State caliphate has produced a humanitarian catastrophe that could linger for years—even decades—without greater international attention and resources. U.S. officials claim there has not been a post-war problem so politically fraught since the end of World War II.
An American ISIS member who surrendered to the Syrian Democratic Forces waits to be interviewed at a makeshift prison at Dashisha, Syria. (Photo credit: Robin Wright/USIP)
You went to the al-Hol camp for ISIS families. What is brewing there?
The U.S.-led coalition, the SDF and international health and aid groups were all ill-prepared to cope with the numbers. When I visited al-Hol, women and children, most covered in filth and with few material possessions, were still being trucked in. They were divided by nationality: Iraqi and Syrian families on one side; foreign families from other countries in a separate area. There were initially not enough tents to hold them all; one Uighur woman from China, who had two small children, told me that they had slept out in the cold at night and were in desperate need of blankets. Again, the stench was overwhelming. The most hard-core women were also trying to re-create the caliphate inside the camp by enforcing ISIS rules or reprimanding women who talked to men or foreign reporters.
Al-Hol represents a humanitarian disaster with long-term consequences. The dilemma now is what to do with 74,000 people living in unsustainable conditions with limited international interest in supporting ISIS families? Is there any way to de-radicalize these women or prevent the radicalization of the children? Given the demographics – that the majority are children – this is the place that may well generate the next generation of ISIS. These people could be in this camp or others like it for decades. I’ve covered the Middle East since the 1973 war; I’ve seen the dreariest Palestinian refugee camps, the chaos of Beirut during Lebanon’s civil war, and I’ve never felt the depth of despair that I felt in al-Hol.
Can the former ISIS fighters be rehabilitated?
The most innovative project I saw was a home-grown rehabilitation program—with no significant resources—conducted by tribes for their members in ISIS. The SDF made a deal with the Arab tribes: In exchange for the tribes’ support in the fight against ISIS, the SDF would hand over tribal members for rehabilitation as long as the men were not implicated in major crimes.
I visited a pilot program in al-Karamah, a town of about 40,000 on the outskirts of Raqqa. It’s a conservative area where Salafism thrives; many of the men I saw wore the short thobes emulating the early Islamic era of the Prophet Mohammed. Rehabilitation was run by tribal sheikhs who preached rebuilding the community rather than destroying it. I interviewed two graduates” of the program—one released a few days earlier and one freed in September 2018—and both claimed they would not go back to ISIS. But neither had a job or a means of supporting their families. So rehabilitation is possible, but it will work only with significant international support for the physical rebuilding of eastern Syria—and the same will be true for Iraq.
Physically, what do you see in northeastern Syria?
Life is beginning to return in shattered towns along the Euphrates River Valley. Schools are reopening. I saw little girls with pony tails carrying pastel backpacks en route to class. Women have shed the black niqab (which covers even the face) required by ISIS; they have reemerged from their homes. I saw women, without male escorts, headed to reopened markets or sitting with husbands having morning tea in the spring sun. This is a conservative, tribal part of Syria, so many women still wear headscarves, or hijab, but I saw women wearing bright red, purple and blue scarves and patterned dresses. Life is no longer literally black.
There also signs of reconstruction, often with very limited resources and even in devastated cities such as Raqqa. I was struck by one common sight: Massive tumbleweeds of rusted steel scavenged from the rubble of destroyed buildings. At several outdoor workshops, men were hammering the rods to straighten them for use as reinforcement rods—or rebars—to rebuild. I saw trucks ferrying them to sites for the foundations of new buildings. The destruction, much of it by airstrikes from the U.S.-led coalition that targeted ISIS facilities, is horrendous. But the destruction in Raqqa was actually not as pervasive as in Iraq’s West Mosul, which was the largest city under ISIS control. It is going to take many years, potentially decades, to rebuild the areas devastated by the war against the Islamic State.
Colombo, May 8: Islamic radicalization has been on the upsurge for a considerable period of time now, mainly because of the unceasing atrocities committed by the US-led Western alliance in several Islamic countries including Libya, Iraq, Syria, Palestine and Afghanistan.
However, like militaristic Western hegemony, Islamic radicalization has also become a major problem for the world. Several countries, both within and outside the Muslim world, have been subjected to its depredations. Like the non-Muslim countries, Muslim countries too have devised methods to tackle the scourge.
Saudi Arabia
Like many other countries, Saudi Arabia too has been a victim of terrorism. Islamic radicals have been indulging in terror regularly since 1962, trying to overthrow the ruling Saud dynasty. Al Qaeda and the Islamic State have been in the forefront of this violent movement.
To counter these forces, the Saudi government has adopted a two pronged approach says Dr.Abdullah Ansary in a paper published by the Middle East Policy Council.
The first prong is ruthless action against those who commit terrorist acts (on April 23, 2019, 37 terrorists were executed). The second prong is re-education and re-indoctrination of detainees, the pool of supporters and fellow travellers.
The goal of the latter is to encourage prisoners to renounce their radical ideology by providing them with psychological and sociological counseling and by engaging them in intensive religious dialogue. It is estimated that only 10% of terror-related prisoners are hardcore with entrenched deviant beliefs. The rest are followers and sympathizers, who can be remoolded.
The committee which is entrusted with such rehabilitation has four sub-committees: religious, psychosocial, security and media.Members of these subcommittees are stationed throughout various districts in the Kingdom.
The Psychological and Social Subcommittee includes more than 30 psychiatrists and psychologists. They also continue to monitor the detainee and evaluate his progress during his interview with the Religious Subcommittee members, and help him understand himself and the restiveness in his personality in order to facilitate his return to appropriate thinking and behavior,” Ansary says.
They also assess the detainee’s financial and psychological needs in order to alleviate psychological pressure, gain the confidence of his family, and provide decent care for him and his family after his release, he adds.
After release, the subcommittee assists them further with healthcare needs and employment. The subcommittee also provides them the opportunity to finish their education while incarcerated, Dr.Ansary says.
The Religious Subcommittee is composed of more than 160 Muslim clerics, scholars and university professors. The counselors engage the prisoners in conversations about their views on several subjects, such as assisting and aiding non-Muslims, the takfir doctrine, judgment according to man-made laws (as opposed to divine law), jihad in Iraq, suicide operations and martyrs, the excommunication of governments and societies (and its gravity), and expelling the polytheists from the Arabian Peninsula,” the author adds.
The goal is to correct prisoners’ flawed understanding of these concepts based on Shariah texts from the Quran and Sunnah and from the work of religious scholars, in order to enhance their understanding of these sensitive topics, Dr.Ansary explains.
On the role of the Security Subcommittee he says it undertakes risk assessments, makes release recommendations and monitors arrangements after the release. The Media Subcommittee supports the Religious Subcommittee with the educational materials used in their program.
In June 2004, the Saudi Council issued a fatwa condemning acts of terrorism, stating that these acts disrupt the security of the country, shed innocent blood, terrorize peaceful people and destroy property. The fatwa called upon citizens and residents to provide authorities with information regarding those who plan or prepare to carry out terrorist acts.”
In addition, during its sixteenth session, held January 5-10, 2002, the Islamic Fiqh Council of the Muslim World League in Mecca stressed the fact that extremism, violence and terrorism have no connection whatsoever with Islam. Furthermore, in a direct warning against fighting abroad in the name of jihad, the Saudi mufti, Sheikh Abdulaziz Aal Al-Sheikh, issued a fatwa on October 1, 2007, prohibiting Saudi youth from traveling abroad to engage in jihad,” Dr.Ansary points out.
The Ministry of Education has conducted an audit of school textbooks and curricula to ensure that teachers do not espouse intolerance and extremism. The government has a program in place to continue to remove any element that is radical and inconsistent with traditional Islam.
Saudi Public TV and other sponsored channels broadcast a five-part series titled Jihad Experiences, the Deceit,” which featured terrorists’ confessions and repentant terrorists’ testimonies of how al-Qaeda organized, trained and recruited.
Controlling Internet
Saudi cyber-crime law imposes a maximum of ten years imprisonment and/or a fine of a maximum of 5 million Saudi riyals ($1.3 million) for anyone who creates a website for a terrorist organization over the Internet or on any computer device, propagates it to facilitate communication with the leaders of these organizations, promotes the organizations’ radical views, or propagates information on how to make explosives.
To ensure that charitable donations are actually used for the purposes designated and not for radical and extremist activities, it has issued numerous decrees and created new institutions designed to tighten the noose” on Islamic charities and control their work, Dr.Ansary said.
Maldives
Maldives was accused of encouraging Islamic radicalism when Abdullah Yameen was President. But the then police spokesperson Ahmad Shifan told this writer that all mosques in Maldives were moderated by the Maldivian government, and that each and every public preaching by mosques were carried out under the government’s direct supervision.
However we believe in rehabilitation and re-integration rather than punishment and isolation. We work on Syria returnees and other terror suspects to convert them to the moderate Maldivian form of Islam.And this has yielded results,” he said, pointing out that after 2012, there had been no Islamic terror attacks.
Pakistan
Pakistan has so far lost 70,000 civilians in terror attacks. Its Prime Minister Imran Khan last week laid the foundation stone of a Sufi university. The al-Qadir University will combine Sufist Islam and spiritualism with science, and re-instill creativity among Muslims now stifled by dogma. The Imran government is trying to modernize the courses taught in the 32,000 Madrassahs with 2.5 million students, by introducing science.
Turkey
In Turkey the Imam Hatip”schools are part of the State’s social engineering.” They are designed to produce ‘enlightened’ religious functionaries and foster an understanding of Islam that is compatible with the needs of a modern State.
Diyanet” is the State religious organization which controls the country’s mosques. The Diyanet also dictates what is preached in the mosques. Turkish President Erdogan is a supporter of Turkey’s brand of secularism called laiklik. Religious thinkers, ulema and Sufi Shaikhs have not been empowered. The Shariah is not a source of legislation. Religious thought has no significant influence in politics. Government retains its monopoly over religious education and outreach. Religious congregations called Cemaats are tightly controlled.
But taking into account the fact that the Turkish people are innately conservative, Erdogan’s s government endorses conservative values, such as teetotalism and female veiling.
Indonesia
Indonesia, another Muslim-majority country, also has State control of religion. But whether the direction is towards liberalism or conservatism has been dependent on the nature of the regime.
President Suharto began as a secular ruler but when he became politically weak he resorted to using conservative Islam to retain control over the population. Later during weak regimes, conservatism came to the fore and intolerance became the order of the day.
The government-controlled religious body, the Indonesian Council of Islamic Scholars (MUI), has taken the conservative side of the spectrum and adopted a militant attitude towards heterodoxy. Mystical sects, the Ahmadiya minority and the Shi`as were reviled. It is against liberal interpretations of Islam, secularism, and the very idea of religious pluralism.
Sri Lanka
In Sri Lanka, Islamic terrorism raised its head with the April 21, 2019 Easter Sunday bombings in which 253 persons died. It is now discovered that radicalization had taken place in the small all-Muslim town of Katthankudy in its Madrassahs, as well as homes of the highly educated and wealthy elite in cosmopolitan Colombo.
Need For Cyber Law
Dr.Rohan Gunaratna, a pre-eminent Sri Lankan expert on West Asian terrorism, has called upon the Lankan government to enact a Cyber Law which will criminalize both posting and keeping extremist content on-line. A co-author of The Three Pillars of Radicalization” published the Oxford University Press in 2019, Dr.Gunaratna urges government to make criminally liable, both the person who posts extremist material and the service provider who keeps the content.
Author of the international best seller Inside al Qaeda: Global Network of Terror (University of Columbia Press), who is currently Professor of Security Studies at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, Dr.Gunaratna says that the government should also set up, in the Security Forces, a Cyber Force to counter on-line extremist content and create an internet referral unit where the public can report extremist content.”
Writing in a local daily, Dishan Joseph informs that a survey by the International Journal on Cyber Warfare found that there were 50 million tweets globally by eight million users with the keywords, ISIS and ISIL. There are 46,000 suspected Twitter accounts (from Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia) that post tweets supporting the Islamic State (IS).
He also calls for a Harmony Act” on the lines of the one in Singapore, which will criminalize hate speech, especially incitement to violence. Given the fact some Sri Lankans had gone overseas as students only to get radicalized, Gunaratna says that Sri Lankans should not be permitted to study in certain schools and universities in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Yemen which produce radical preachers.
He urges the government to draw up a Black List of radical preachers and ban their entry into Sri Lanka. At the same time, government should criminalize the sale and distribution of radical books and publications.
Foreign religious preachers should be given a visa only after getting clearance from the Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Intelligence agencies, he adds. Further, anyone allowed to preach in Sri Lanka should have a two-year (but renewable) permit.
On 28 June 1914, a 19-year old Bosnian-Serb, Gavrilo Princip, shot and killed the heir apparent to the Austrian throne, Archduke Francis Ferdinand, unaware that the act would push the world into a five year long World War killing 16 million people and ending with the most unequal Treaty of Versailles.
Given that humiliating closure for the vanquished powers, experts describe the Second World War as nothing but a continuation of the First World War.
World War II ended with two atomic bombs being dropped on Japan thus unleashing the nuclear age and also the Cold War era where scenarios of ‘nuclear armageddon ‘and ‘nuclear winter’ were to raise specters of human extinction.
It took more than a decade, and the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, for the proponents of the post-1945 Cold War to even recognize this phenomenon and ascribe it a name. Their deterrence theologies meanwhile fine-tuned ‘mutual assured destruction’ and ‘city busting’ doctrines. These, it is said, have assured that there would be no Third World War.
In terms of the their pervasiveness and destructive power the two World Wars involved a few European powers along with some of their colonies, and China and Japan. Sabre-rattling about nuclear brinkmanship involved only two superpowers and their military alliances, leaving the bulk of the world nonaligned.
Terrorism, A Totally New Challenge
But terrorism is a different kettle of fish altogether. It is truly global and all embracing. The existential challenge from terrorism today is completely different. Bigger and wider than all manifestations of violence so far, terrorism presents the most pervasive global killing machine without chances of redress or respite.
Terrorism has been there since ancient times. But today it has developed an unprecedented system-shaking power undermining state structures. Today, terrorism is incrementally destroying the human race; in tiny and not-so-tiny packages, on a daily basis. Its world wide web saw growth after the collapse of the Soviet Union that ended the rigid bipolar system. 9/11 has since seen the world wake up to the power and potential of outfits like Al Qaeda and the Islamic State, and several of their franchisees like Al Shabab, Abu Sayaf, Boko Haram, Haqqani Network, Hezbollah, Lashkar-e-Toiba, Jaish-e-Mohammed etc eroding centuries old state-centric peace-preserving customs, conventions and capacities.
Like mosquitoes biting a tiger, these radicalized invisible fighters with no legal or moral compunctions, are often able to choose their time and place of attack while State agencies remain rule bound, highly visible and therefore vulnerable.
States often respond by increasing the dose of the same old prescription, namely, expanding the apparatus of security and surveillance, with little time and capacity to revisit their diagnoses.
This results in the State being accused of attacking civil liberties and human rights. By sleepwalking in their denial mode, they fall victim to the global chessboard of terrorists dictating attacks at easier yet visible targets like what one saw in Sri Lanka this April.
Those with leverage, are cutting secret deals with terrorists. The dialogue with a ‘moderate’ Taliban is aimed at ensuring that terrorists do not harm their citizens, interests and investments. No doubt, one country’s freedom fighter continues to be another’s terrorist.
Apart from this unending physical death and destruction, the real sting of terrorism lies is germinating similar impulses in other people’s minds; sowing divisive tendencies amongst and within communities and nations.
For example, soon after the Easter Sunday terrorist attack on Christian churches in Sri Lanka, last weekend saw Jews being stunned by sounds of gunfire in their place of worship in Poway ,a suburb of city of San Diego in the United States. A 19-year old with an AR-15 walked into the Chabad last Saturday afternoon shouting anti-Semitic slurs. He managed to kill only one and injure three thanks to weapon’s malfunction. But a myopic and whimsical President Trump continues to treat repeated attacks by White supremacists as the handiwork of a few misguided people.”
Bloody April
A cursory glance at Wikipedia shows that not a single day of April passed without terrorist incidents. To recount some major ones, the month began with 62 people being killed in Burkina Faso. On 3rd April the Taliban in Afghanistan killed 30 soldiers in Bala Murghab. On 12 April a suicide attack in Quetta (Pakistan) killed 20 people. Taliban killed seven Afghan soldiers in Ghor. On 15th April Boko Haram killed seven soldiers in Chad but forces retaliation killed 63 terrorists. On 18 th. Baloch separatists in Pakistan killed fourteen people and the ISIS killed ten Syrian soldiers. On 21st April, when the world woke up to suicide attacks in Sri Lanka, Al Qaeda killed sixteen soldiers in Mali.
Eleven Syrian soldiers were killed on 24th April. A police raid in Kalmunai in Sri Lanka led to the death of sixteen on 26th April. Last Saturday saw Al Qaeda killing 22 Syrian soldiers in Aleppo.
The 9/11 attack in New York killed 2,977 people from 58 nations. It was followed by the March 2004 Madrid attacks killing 193. In September 2004 there was a siege of a school in Beslan in North Ossetia in which 334 were killed. In August 2007 a car bomb attack on Yazidis near Mosul in Iran killed about 500. In December 2007, attacks in Congo killed 620. In the May 2014 Boko Haram attacks in Gamboru and Ngala in Nigeria over 300 were killed.
In July 2014 Boko Haram attacks on the Iraqi air force cadets’ Camp Speicher in Tikrit in Iraq killed 1500. In July 2017 Mogadishu (Somalia) was attacked killing 600. In November 2017 attacks on a mosque in Bir al-Abed in Egypt killed 200. In July 2018 attacks in Sweida in Syria killed over 200 people.
According to a U.S. Department of Homeland Security report, on average, there were 715 terrorist attacks, causing 1,563 deaths, injuring 1,623 people, and involving 745 hostages or kidnap victims per month worldwide in 2017.
By all accounts this seems like an unending nightmare.
The ISIS today represents the most visible and brutal face of global terrorism. Following the retreat of its battle-hardened core fighters from Iraq and Syria, its strength lies in its silent sympathizers and its pool of online radicalized youth. The strength of ISIS is believed to be its financial muscle with millions of dollars laundered through banks and invested in legitimate businesses earning revenues for providing radicalized youth with weapons and incentives. It has been successful in recruiting suicide bombers in multiple nations, providing them training in bomb-making far way from the Caliphate.
So, even as the Caliphate is territorially weakened, its communications network is still alive and kicking. This calls for a foolproof, globally calibrated information and intelligence-led ‘pre-empting the predator’ strategy.
With such a monster knocking at the door, contrarian analyses sometimes make a moral appeal putting death and destruction in perspective. Analysts of this genre cite Oxfam data for 2017 showing how 80 lakh children under 5 years of age die due to multiple causes including malnutrition, while terrorism and armed conflicts together kill no more than 77, 000.
The Seattle-based Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation data for 2017 shows cardiovascular diseases being the cause for nearly 32 per cent deaths around the world compared to terrorism which accounts for just 0.06 per cent.
While all other challenges remain important, none of these other causes of death and destruction — natural disasters included — threaten our ‘way of life’ and that’s what makes threats from terrorism so different.
Therefore, this calls for urgent and extraordinary global initiatives to redress or rein in the emerging global monster of terrorism.
Assessments like the Global Terrorism Index 2018 complied by the Institute for Economics and Peace show how, having peaked in 2014, terrorism-related deaths and destruction have declined for the last three years. But this should be taken with a pinch of salt.
Of all security challenges, terrorism has been least amenable to predictions and projections of any kind. Its past is not a reliable frame for predicting its future strategies.
(Dr.Swaran Singh Author is Professor of Diplomacy and Disarmament at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi)
Colombo, May 4: The sharp rise of Jehadi terrorism in response to the Western nations’ continued atrocities against Islamic countries in the Middle East and Afghanistan, has created, in many countries, a need to curb extremist propaganda.
Some of the countries threatened by Islamic radicalism are Muslim-majority.
However, attitudes to extremism and the methods used for curbing extremism vary, depending on the objective conditions.
The immediate demand in a country subjected to a Jehadi attack is for control over the curricula of the Madrassahs or Islamic religious schools.
Since the emergence of oil-rich Saudi Arabia and the Middle East as financial giants, Madrassahs in many countries, which get workers’ remittances from West Asia, have been coming under the influence of Wahabi or Salafist versions of Islam, which have replaced the traditional, locally-rooted, and softer versions of Islam geared to the needs of a multi-religious society.
Cyber Platform
In the current cyber age, Jehadi extremism has found a better and more powerful platform, the internet. Propaganda and recruitment is now being done on-line. The recruitment pool for Jehadi terrorism is no longer confined to the traditional village Madrassah but includes homes and offices of the highly educated and wealthy elite.
This has enabled the radicalization of the educated and well-heeled elite. And the leadership of the elite enjoys legitimacy in the eyes of the hoi polloi who serve as the foot soldiers of extremist Islam.
With the internet becoming a major tool, networking, recruitment and execution of plans have become international and targets of attack have also become international. Terror strikes can take place anywhere on earth to destabilize the existing order and demoralize the existing religious and political orders..
Need For Cyber Law
Dr.Rohan Gunaratna, a pre-eminent Sri Lankan expert on West Asian terrorism, calls upon Sri Lanka to enact a Cyber Law which will criminalize both posting and keeping extremist content on-line. A co-author of The Three Pillars of Radicalization” published the Oxford University Press in 2019, Dr.Gunaratna urges government to make criminally liable, both the person who posts extremist material and the service provider who keeps the content.
Author of the international best seller Inside al Qaeda: Global Network of Terror (University of Columbia Press), who is currently Professor of Security Studies at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, Dr.Gunaratna says that the government should also set up in the Security Forces, a Cyber Force to counter on-line extremist content and create an internet referral unit where the public can report extremist content.”
Writing in a local daily, Dishan Joseph informs that a survey by the International Journal on Cyber Warfare found that there were 50 million tweets globally by eight million users with the keywords, ISIS and ISIL. There are 46,000 suspected Twitter accounts (from Iran, Iraq and Saudi Arabia) that post tweets supporting the ISIS. Many tweets also originate from the Al-Khansaa Brigade, ISIS’s an all-women police force, Joseph points out.
According to him, a captured jihadist in India had confessed that he was first asked to download a ‘chat secure’ mobile app and then use Pidgin – an encrypted tool, to avoid detection as he chatted with his handler..
To counter extremist content, the FBI in the US uses the Carnivore system to read e-mails and online communication. Dr.Gunaratna urges the Lankan government engage with the US because its technology is 20 years ahead of China’s.”
He also calls for a Harmony Act” on the lines of the one in Singapore, which will criminalize hate speech, especially incitement to violence. Given the fact some Sri Lankans had gone overseas as students only to get radicalized, Gunaratna says that Sri Lankans should not be permitted to study in certain schools and universities in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Yemen which produce radical preachers.
He urged the government to draw up a Black List of radical preachers and ban their entry into Sri Lanka. At the same time, government should criminalize the sale and distribution of radical books and publications.
Foreign religious preachers should be given a visa only after getting clearance from the Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Intelligence agencies, he adds. Further, anyone allowed to preach in Sri Lanka should have a two-year (but renewable) permit.
Control in Muslim-majority countries
Religion has been a problem even in Muslim majority countries. Some of these countries have devised ways to control Islamic thought to suit the State’s ideology and interests.
In Pakistan, Prime Minister Imran Khan last week laid the foundation stone of a Sufi university. The al-Qadir University will combine Sufist Islam and spiritualism with science, and re-instill creativity among Muslims now stifled by dogma. The Imran Khan government is trying to control the courses taught in the madrassahs also.
In Turkey the Imam Hatip”schools are part of the State’s social engineering.” They are designed to produce ‘enlightened’ religious functionaries and foster an understanding of Islam that is compatible with the needs of a modern State.
Diyanet” is the State religious organization which controls the country’s mosques. The Diyanet also dictates what is preached in the mosques.
But the downside is that the Diyanet” has become a front of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) led by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Indonesia, another Muslim-majority country, also has State control of religion. Under President Suharto, Indonesia was a secular country. But when he became weak with the US abandoning him, he opted to exploit the fundamentalist Islamic sentiments among his people to retain control.
The transition to democracy from autocratic rule in Indonesia which began in 1998, ushered in a period of unstable governments. This again led governments to use conservative Islam to stay in power. The government controlled religious body, the Indonesian Council of Islamic Scholars (MUI), took the conservative side of the spectrum and adopted a militant attitude towards heterodoxy.Mystical sects, the Ahmadiya minority and the Shi`as were reviled. It is against liberal interpretations of Islam, secularism, and the very idea of religious pluralism.
The lesson appears to be that when a government is strong, institutions meant to control religious thought and practice, side with liberal forces. But when it is weak, fundamentalists gain the upper hand. A weak regime actually promotes fundamentalism in the hope that the conservative majority will be appeased and will support it.
In Turkey, after the 1980 coup, the military-backed government sought to promote a conservative religious-nationalistic doctrine, the Turkish-Islamic Synthesis”. The aim was to fight communism as well as political Islam.
The religious council or bureaucracy Diyanet” was given an important role. The number of mosques and imams under its control rapidly expanded. Imam Hatip(partly secular and partly religious) schools became popular. Many graduates of Imam Hatip schools sought to continue their education in various professional or academic institutions and then join government service.
The AKP led by Erdogan, was to a large extent, an emancipation movement of the conservative Muslim segments of the population that had been marginalized under Kemalism (the ideology of Mustafa Kemal, founder of modern Turkey).
TheImam Hatip schools played a part in the emancipation of the conservatives. But the old secularist elite has been replaced now by the counter-elite of Erdoğan in alliance with an assortment of pragmatic allies.
Internationally, Erdogan is with the Muslim Brotherhood. But in domestic politics he has largely abjured Islamization. He is a supporter of Turkey’s brand of secularism called laiklik. Religious thinkers, ulema and Sufi shaikhs have not been empowered. The Shariah is not a source of legislation. Religious thought has no significant influence in politics. Government retains its monopoly over religious education and outreach. Religious congregations called Cemaats are tightly controlled.
All of this is quite unlike the situation in Indonesia.
But at the same, taking into account the fact that the Turkish people are innately conservative, Erdogan’s s government endorses conservative values, such as teetotalism and female veiling.
Colombo, May 6 (Daily Mirror): The Archbishop of Colombo, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith, said on Monday that some trouble makers are using the Easter Sunday suicide attacks to foment Christian-Muslim clashes and pave the way for foreign intervention.
Meanwhile, Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena has appealed to the media not to cover searches going on in relation to the Easter Sunday blasts as these premature reports are endangering innocent people.
Police spokesman Ruwan Gunasekara said that cash amounting LKR 140 million and assets worth LKR 7 billion have been discovered in raids on the premises of terror suspects.
The CID has already suspended these bank accounts, the police spokesperson said
During a raid at a house in Thalapitiya, Galle police have arrested a person along with over 1000 clothes similar to uniforms of the tri-forces and the Sri Lanka Civil Security Force.
Gunasekara said 54 suspects including 7 women arrested in connection with the attacks are currently in custody of the CID, while 19 suspects are held by the Terrorist Investigation Division (TID).
Cardinal’s Appeal
Referring to the communal clashes in Negombo last Sunday, the Cardinal said that they were the work of several outsiders who had entered Negombo to create unrest between the Sinhalese and the Muslims.
Cardinal Ranjith told a press conference that the said outsiders inebriated the residents in the area and provoked them into violence.
I request the government to close all liquor shops in vulnerable areas. These forces are trying to create unrest in Sri Lanka to pave the way for external interference. Some forces are trying to provoke people and create religious unrest. The clash in Negombo is a perfect example for this. Those who are behind it are outsiders. They are attempting to create unrest among the Sinhalese and the Muslims. I ask all Catholics not to raise their hands against Muslims as they are not behind these destructive efforts. It had been done by a group of individuals who had gone astray. They are backed by some international forces. We don’t have to harm innocent Muslims because of this group,” he said.
Cardinal Ranjith said no one should jump into conclusions without knowing the real facts. He said some were using social media to mislead people.
People supported the police and the security forces to carry out search operations since the Easter Sunday tragedy. We appreciate the patience of the people,” Cardinal Ranjith said while appealing to the Buddhists, Muslims and Hindus not to get agitated but to help maintain peace in the country.
I appeal to people to continue to support the security forces. I request the Catholics to live according to the teachings of Jesus and pray for the country.
Maithripala Sirisena
President’s Request To Media
A request not to telecast search operations at houses and public places through media has been made to President Maithripala Sirisena by several persons.
Clear instructions have been given to the security forces to not allow the participation of civilians when conducting search operations and that they have to be conducted exclusively by the members of the security forces.
At the present, a special security program has been implemented across the country, as per instructed by the President and under the guidance and supervision of the Ministry of Defense, following the unexpected and regrettable incidents of violence on the Easter Sunday.
Under this process, investigations are carried out continuously and houses, public places, and vehicles are inspected.
As a result of unwarranted media publicity for these investigations, various communities in the society are facing difficulties and persons who are not involved in terrorist activities in any way face great inconveniences as the society has deemed them as terrorists.
Various sections of the society, including religious leaders, have made requests to the President with regard to this several times. Considering those requests, in order to prevent any further inconveniences to any community in the society, the Government has requested all the media institutions not to conduct media coverage on these search operation
Colombo, April 30 (newsin.asia): The Sri Lankan government’s handling of the situation in the country after the April 21 serial bombings, has drawn heavy flak from various quarters in the country including the head of the Catholic church, Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith.
Cardinal Ranjith had earlier been extremely sympathetic to the beleaguered government of President Maithripala Sirisena and Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe following the blasts which occurred in three churches and three posh hotels among other places killing 253 people.
He had immediately appealed to his flock not to take the law into their own hands, be calm and cooperate with the government.
But disappointed with the way the situation was developing in the past week, he told the media on Monday: I cannot see any measures being taken to find solutions to the issue of national security by those entrusted with the task. These politicians are once again playing their favorite blame game. As a result, the country and the people are continuing to suffer.”
Apprehensive that the blame game is related to the forthcoming elections, the Cardinal said: At this juncture, we do not need polls.”
Presidential and nine Provincial elections are due by the end of the year and Parliamentary elections are due in the first half of 2020. In that situation, politicians are criticizing each other, accusing others of negligence and even complicity in the planning and execution of the suicide bombings carried out by the National Taweheed Jamaat (MTJ) and the Jamathei Millathu Ibraheemi (JMI) at the behest of the Islamic State.
Call For All Party Government
The Cardinal went on to say: In this context, I call upon all political parties in this country to form an All Party Government to resolve this issue if the need is for that.”
I also urge the President and Prime Minister to set aside their differences and to map out policy towards ensuring that national security is not compromised in this country at any stage in the future.”
The people are yet to be convinced that the country’ political leaders are attempting to resolve this issue by working together. They are only interested in scoring points, both personally, and for their respective political parties. We cannot see any coordination of the security measures.”
He pointed out that police are raiding places only on the basis of tip-offs by locals and not on their own intelligence. He urged a house to house search.
If illegal weapons were found, the occupants of the houses must be taken into custody and thoroughly grilled. Some of those involved in the blasts could have fled from the country,” he added.
About the Presidential Commission appointed to probe blasts on April 22, Cardinal Ranjith said that he is still in the dark as to whether those in the commission have even begun their deliberations, or any evidence has been sought from witnesses.”
He feared that this commission might go the way of previous Presidential Commissions which contributed little to the improvements in the country.
Opposing the appointment of retired officials to the Presidential Commission on the blasts, the Cardinal said that a body of religious leaders should be set up to oversee the work of the commission.
Warning Of Religious Leaders’-Led Agitation
In a grim warning to the government, Cardinal Ranjith said: I make it bold to say that if there is no formidable security network it will be impossible to contain the masses from rising against the government. That is because we cannot be trotting out lies to the people day in and day out and attempt to tell them to remain calm and collected.”
If an MP or cabinet minister is behind these attacks please apprehend them and grill them. The Buddhist monks, the Maulavis and Hindu priests are all standing together to make these requests. If these requests are not fulfilled, we will be forced to step into the streets. To oppose the actions of the government we (the religious leaders) will be marching right in the front.”
We finally request the government to implement the law without fear or favor without leaving room for us to take the law into out our own hands,” the Cardinal added.
Endorsing Cardinal Ranjith’s statement, the Chief Prelate of the Kotte Sri Kalyani Samagri Dharma Maha Sangha Sabha, Venerable Ittapane Dhammalankara Thero said: We cannot see those in the topmost positions of the government taking decisions jointly as they are divided to the core politically.”
Flawed Counter Terrorism Bill
Meanwhile, the chair of the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP) Prof. G.L.Peiris told the media that the present Emergency Powers and the existing Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) are enough to fight terrorism and there is no need for a new Counter-Terrorism Bill (CTA). After all, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) were defeated with such powers, Peiris recalled. He feared that the CTA would be used only against trade unions and the democratic opposition.
Udaya Gammanpila of the Pivithuru Jatika Hela Urumaya said that the Counter-Terrorism Bill, if passed, will let foreign terrorists off the hook as Sri Lanka will not be able to prosecute them without the consent of their national governments. Furthermore, the death penalty, which is there in the existing PTA, will be replaced by life imprisonment and bail will be given on payment of LKR one million.
Council of Ex-Muslims of Sri Lanka (CEMSL)
The CEMSL has also opposed the on-going raids. In a press release, the ex-Muslims said: Considering the prevailing situation in the country, the Council of Ex-Muslims of Sri Lanka considers that it would be an appropriate and wise step for media and security forces to avoid giving unnecessary publicity to the finding of swords, hatchets, knives and shotguns from Masjids and individual homes.
Giving unnecessary publicity to the findings which are not related to ISIS terrorists would create more and more hatred towards innocent Muslims among other communities as well as delay the return of normal life in the country.”
This would also divert the attention of the security forces and the public to a different direction from which terrorists could benefit.”
In most cases, the swords, knives, hatchets, and shotguns found in Masjids and some houses are not related to ISIS terrorists.”
Although we have no doubt that such acts are illegal, we request those concerned to be mindful of the following facts.”
Background To Possession Of Some Weapons
The CEMSL further said that following the riots of Mawanella, Beruwela, Aluthgama, and Kandy, out of fear of the possibility of being attacked by racists, Muslims could have kept swords for defensive purposes.
Also, some individuals could have kept swords to protect themselves from thieves, other intruders and for settling personal disputes. Shotguns are often used for illegal hunting. Underworld gangs also keep their weapons in hidings.
Masjids store knives and hatchets for Kurbani (Annual animal sacrifice during Hajj period) purposes.
Though we have left Islam, we are able to understand the above as we are also from the Muslim community. Considering the present situation of the country, we request that unnecessary media publicity should not be given to findings for above-mentioned items which are not related to ISIS related activities, unless it’s clearly mentioned,” the CEMSL said.
(The featured image at the top is that of Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith)
President Maithripala Sirisena stated that Batticaloa University will be assigned under the Ministry of Higher Education.
He mentioned this speaking to Northern Province state officials and Muslim youths in the area during an observational visit to the Sainthamarudu in Kalmunai.
The President said that a clear decision will also be taken regarding the syllabus taught at the university.
Suicide bomber Mohammad Hasthoon’s wife, Pulasthini Mahendran (some reports mention it as Pulasthini Rajendran) aka Sara who is believed to be an active participant in the recent bombings, was born in a devout Hindu lower middle class family and was converted to Islam and radicalised, a report by popular Tamil channel IBC Tamizh has revealed.
As per the report, Pulasthini was born in a middle-class Hindu family in Thettativu, situated in Batticaloa district in Eastern Province in Sri Lanka and was allegedly abducted, converted to Islam and radicalised by Islamists groups.
IBC Tamizh’s interview with her mother, Kavitha Mahendran reveals that Pulasthini was a good student who was pursuing medical studies. She used to pursue traditional Tamil and Hindu religious studies in school. However, one Abdul Razik abducted Pulasthini when she was a student.
Kavitha claims that she tried to bring her daughter back, but Razik insisted that Pulasthini was ‘happy’ and that she had made an ‘informed adult decision’. A few months later, Razik called Kavitha to inform her that her daughter had ‘embraced’ Islam and was married off to a man. Her husband is believed to the Mohammad Hasthoon, who was caught on camera at the St Sebastian Church bombing on Easter Sunday.
A devasted Kavitha cut off all ties with her daughter. A month after this, Kavitha claims she got a call from her distraught daughter who said she was unhappy in her life and she was on the verge of a complete breakdown. However, after this phone call, there was no contact from Pulasthini.
Around two weeks before the Easter Sunday attacks, Kavitha claims an unknown man, who identified himself as Sri Lankan intelligence officer had come looking for Pulasthini but didn’t divulge any information.
IBC report reveals that Abul Razik is actually a leader of the radical Islamic organisation, Sri Lankan Thowheed Jamaath (SLTJ) which has close ideological ties with the Tamil Nadu Thowheed Jamaath.
ISIS had claimed responsibility for the serial blasts that shook Sri Lanka last month claiming lives of over 200 people. The sons of one of the richest and politically well-connected man were found to be two of the suicide bombers. The family is under interrogation after the wife of one of the bombers triggered another suicide blast to kill policemen in their Colombo dwelling.
The Maligawatte police have found 56 swords in a well in the Maligawatte area in Colombo, today (08).
https://youtu.be/i-bt-Ozbeh8
Reportedly, 44 Chinese manufactured swords, 12 old swords, 49 knives, 26 CDs with covers with Arabic writing letters on them, a firearm, and a narcotic drug called ‘Ice’ have been found inside a 20-feet deep well near a mosque in Maligawatte.
However, the Ada Derana correspondent, who had gone to report search operation conducted by Navy divers, had been obstructed by a certain group who had been at the scene.
Meanwhile, 16 knives had been found when inspecting a suspicious parcel abandoned at the Arnold Ratnayake Road in Maradana. The parcel was found by the CMC employees at the Sudewella worksite.
Furthermore, a stock of sharp weapons including swords was found hidden among clothes inside the cupboard of a house in Kumbukkandura area. Theldeniya police stated two persons were arrested with this regard.
Eleven knives including Italian-manufactured knives have been found near the Richmond Hill by the Special Crimes Division of the Galle Police.
The person, at whose house the knives were found, has also been arrested by the Police.
Several suspicious items were recovered from sugarcane cultivation belonging to Pelwatte sugar factory.
Accordingly, 5 walkie-talkies, uniforms worn by security details of VIPs and some other items were found during a search which was carried out based on the information received from the driver of sugar factory’s chief operations officer.
The Chief Operations Officer Surath Amadeen yesterday (07) held a secretive discussion with 13 of fellow Muslim employees at the factory and had hindered other employees from entering the room where the discussion took place.
Owing to this incident, unrest emerged at the factory and the officers of Buttala Police and Police Special Task Force had arrived at the site to curtail the tense situation.
The Buttala police officers interrogated the chief operations officer, while the Police STF had searched his house.
Amadeen’s driver was taken into the custody of CID yesterday.
A stock of items including swords, knives, drugs, a firearm and bullets have been recovered from the bottom of a public well located in close proximity to a mosque near the R. Premadasa stadium in Maligawatta, Colombo.
Ada Derana reporter said that the discovery was made during a search operation carried out by security forces personnel in the Maligawatta area today (8).
He said that a total of 58 swords, including 46 new swords (with red logo) and 12 old swords, 4 knives, 26 CDs, a small pistol, several bullets and a packet of crystal meth also known as ‘ice’ were found at the location.
The items were recovered with the assistance of police divers.
No arrests have been made over the finding while Maligawatta Police is conducting further investigations.
Opposition Leader Mahinda Rajapaksa today urged Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe to appoint a Parliamentary Select Committee to examine the proposed Counter-Terrorism Act.
Issuing a statement, he says that opposition has been mounting against the proposed act from every part of society and that several major political parties represented in parliament have already voiced strong objections to it.
Considering this situation, the Opposition Leader makes a special request to the Prime Minister to appoint a Parliamentary Select Committee to carry out a broad study and review of the proposed act.
The Police Special Investigation Unit (SIU) has commenced an investigation to determine as to whether any errors had been committed by the police in granting bail to 9 suspects arrested at the Wellampitiya copper factory, which is believed to be linked to the Easter Sunday terror attacks.
Mohamed Ibrahim Insaf Ahmed, the suicide bomber responsible for the blast at the Cinnamon Grand in Colombo on April 21, is the owner of the copper factory at Wellampitiya.
On April 22, nine employees of the factory were arrested by Wellampitiya Police and remanded until May 06 after being produced at the Colombo Magistrate’s Court.
When the case was taken up on May 06, the court released the nine suspects on bail while it had been widely reported that the suspects were granted bail due to an error or oversight on the part of the officers of the Wellampitiya Police Station.
Police Spokesman SP Ruwan Gunasekara said that the Police Headquarters’ SIU has launched an investigation into this.
Speaking at a press conference in Colombo today (8), he said that if it is confirmed through the investigation that an error or oversight by a Wellampitiya police officer had led to this, strict action will be taken against the said officer.
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