Wednesday March 18, 2009
Iran in Latin America Finally Acknowledged As A Problem
After several years of reporting on the increasing ties of Iran to Latin American insurgent and criminal groups (see this paper and this one I did for the International Assessment and Strategy Center), it is nice to see senior officials now finally acknowledging the seriousness of the issue.
"We have seen... an increase in a wide level of activity by the Iranian government in this region," (Admiral James) Stavridis told the Senate Armed Services Committee.
"That is a concern principally because of the connections between the government of Iran, which is a state sponsor of terrorism, and Hezbollah," he said.
Unfortunately, the admiral did not note the Iranian financial institutions in Venezuela and Panama, or other visible and worrisome aspects of the Iranian presence.
What one has to ask oneself is, why is Iran so willing to spend precious resources in a region where it has no religious, cultural, historical or linguistic ties? As we see below, the multiple promises of economic aid are seldom fulfilled, nor is there any accounting of the Iranian money that flows to these governments. Yet, their diplomatic missions grow exponentially, offering the perfect cover for the Quds Force and Hezbollah to move freely.
Some of the activities of Iran in Nicaragua are outlined by Todd Bensman, who has been one of the few journalists to pursue the issue.
Here is part of what he found:
found that no Iranian money or concrete planning had materialized for a promised new $350 million port on the eastern seaboard bay known as Monkey Point. The Iranians had only made at least a couple of easy day trips there and elsewhere around the country aboard helicopters. Neither had anything developed from Iranian promises to redevelop the dilapidated western port of Corinto, which supposedly would be linked to this Monkey Point port by a dry land canal. To date, no progress on either project has been reported. But the Iranian diplomatic mission that American national security experts most feared was sure up and humming with activity. It has steadily expanded its "staff," according to some scattered local Nicaragua news reports.
I also discovered that suspected Iranian Revolutionary Guard operatives had been moving in and out of the country in unusual ways that assured secrecy. For instance, I was given ministry of migration documents that show a senior Nicaraguan minister had allowed 21 Iranian men to enter without passport processing. This was exactly the kind of activity that preceded the Argentina bombings in 1992 and 1994. It’s the same kind of secretive movement going on in and out of Venezuela that gives current and former American counterterrorism officials — and Jewish communities in the region — the cold sweats.
This gets to the center of Iran's relationships in the region. Some countries, notably Brazil, maintain diplomatic and economic relations with Iran part of the normal international dealings. They are transparent, above-board and open to public scrutiny and debate.
Yet the relations of Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua with Iran bear none of those characteristics. All are shrouded in secrecy, not subject to normal oversight by legislative and cabinet officials, and full of multiple irregularities. Given Iran's direct sponsorship of Hezbollah, its history of carrying out violent attacks in the region and Hezbollah's decades-long ties to organized criminal activities to raise money, concern about these activities is not misplaced.
Stavridis said Hezbollah activities in South America have been concentrated particularly in the border region between Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina, but also in Colombia.
"We have been seeing in Colombia a direct connection between Hezbollah activity and narco-trafficking activity," the commander added, without providing specifics.
Colombia said last October that it had smashed a drug and money-laundering ring suspected of shipping funds to Hezbollah.
In fact, the drug ring in Colombia was a small part of a multi-continent criminal enterprise run by Hezbollah that helped it raise millions of dollars a year.
There are multiple crises in the world. But the Iranian willingness to spend scarce resources on building an infrastructure in Latin America is clearly one that needs to be taken seriously.
"We have seen... an increase in a wide level of activity by the Iranian government in this region," (Admiral James) Stavridis told the Senate Armed Services Committee.
"That is a concern principally because of the connections between the government of Iran, which is a state sponsor of terrorism, and Hezbollah," he said.
Unfortunately, the admiral did not note the Iranian financial institutions in Venezuela and Panama, or other visible and worrisome aspects of the Iranian presence.
What one has to ask oneself is, why is Iran so willing to spend precious resources in a region where it has no religious, cultural, historical or linguistic ties? As we see below, the multiple promises of economic aid are seldom fulfilled, nor is there any accounting of the Iranian money that flows to these governments. Yet, their diplomatic missions grow exponentially, offering the perfect cover for the Quds Force and Hezbollah to move freely.
Some of the activities of Iran in Nicaragua are outlined by Todd Bensman, who has been one of the few journalists to pursue the issue.
Here is part of what he found:
found that no Iranian money or concrete planning had materialized for a promised new $350 million port on the eastern seaboard bay known as Monkey Point. The Iranians had only made at least a couple of easy day trips there and elsewhere around the country aboard helicopters. Neither had anything developed from Iranian promises to redevelop the dilapidated western port of Corinto, which supposedly would be linked to this Monkey Point port by a dry land canal. To date, no progress on either project has been reported. But the Iranian diplomatic mission that American national security experts most feared was sure up and humming with activity. It has steadily expanded its "staff," according to some scattered local Nicaragua news reports.
I also discovered that suspected Iranian Revolutionary Guard operatives had been moving in and out of the country in unusual ways that assured secrecy. For instance, I was given ministry of migration documents that show a senior Nicaraguan minister had allowed 21 Iranian men to enter without passport processing. This was exactly the kind of activity that preceded the Argentina bombings in 1992 and 1994. It’s the same kind of secretive movement going on in and out of Venezuela that gives current and former American counterterrorism officials — and Jewish communities in the region — the cold sweats.
This gets to the center of Iran's relationships in the region. Some countries, notably Brazil, maintain diplomatic and economic relations with Iran part of the normal international dealings. They are transparent, above-board and open to public scrutiny and debate.
Yet the relations of Venezuela, Bolivia and Nicaragua with Iran bear none of those characteristics. All are shrouded in secrecy, not subject to normal oversight by legislative and cabinet officials, and full of multiple irregularities. Given Iran's direct sponsorship of Hezbollah, its history of carrying out violent attacks in the region and Hezbollah's decades-long ties to organized criminal activities to raise money, concern about these activities is not misplaced.
Stavridis said Hezbollah activities in South America have been concentrated particularly in the border region between Brazil, Paraguay and Argentina, but also in Colombia.
"We have been seeing in Colombia a direct connection between Hezbollah activity and narco-trafficking activity," the commander added, without providing specifics.
Colombia said last October that it had smashed a drug and money-laundering ring suspected of shipping funds to Hezbollah.
In fact, the drug ring in Colombia was a small part of a multi-continent criminal enterprise run by Hezbollah that helped it raise millions of dollars a year.
There are multiple crises in the world. But the Iranian willingness to spend scarce resources on building an infrastructure in Latin America is clearly one that needs to be taken seriously.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Thursday March 12, 2009
A European Criminal Investigation into the Muslim Brotherhood
The Global Muslim Brotherhood Daily Report (free subscription required) brings the otherwise unreported here news of a major criminal investigation into several Muslim Brotherhood leaders and groups in Germany and Belgium. The raids were publicly announced in Germany, but have not been widely reported. The site also provides links to other reports, particularly by the NEFA Foundations on some of those under investigation.
What is striking is the stature of the institutions that were raided on suspicion of money laundering, criminal activities, acquisition of property under false pretenses, and aiding "Islamists" and violent Islamic jihadists.
One thing this shows is that, despite the constant protests to the contrary, at least the German prosecutors and those of several other nations, believe there is, in fact, a transnational Ikhwan organization. There is, but the Brotherhood usually denies its existence.
It also shows the wealth and power the group has acquired over time. It set up in Germany in the early 1960s, and has rolled on, virtually unchallenged and unexamined, since. This is not unlike the MB groups in the United States, as outlined by prosecutors in the Holy Land Foundation case, who have spread influence as a "mainstream" Islamic organization.
This case is particularly important because it goes to the intricate financial, real estate and mosque structure the MB has build over several decades in Europe, where it has often served as a gateway for those who join violent jihad.
According to the GMBDR:
Also, according to sources in Germany, the Belgian aspect of the investigation involves Al-Aqsa Belgium, the Belgian member organization of the Union of Good, a coalition of charities headed by global Muslim Brotherhood leader Youssef Qaradawi that is designated by the U.S. as raising funds for Hamas., a group directly linked to Yousef al-Qaradawi.
Another individual in the investigation is likely to be Ayman Aly who, along with Mr. El-Zayat is an officer of the Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe (FIOE), the umbrella organization for the Muslim Brotherhood in Europe. A 2005 Wall Street Journal article reported on transfers of money from the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY) to the Albania branch of Taibah International, an Islamic charity whose Bosnian branch was designated as a terrorist entity by both the U.S and the U.N in 2004. According to the Journal report, the money was transfered by two Mr. El-Zayat and Mr. Aly :
Federation officials also have helped channel money to Islamic groups in the Balkans. A key figure in this effort is Ibrahim el-Zayat, who as head of the Islamic Community of Germany, a founding group in the federation, is one of Europe’s most prominent Muslims. In 2002, German federal police launched an investigation of Mr. Zayat. According to copies of a report reviewed by the Journal, he allegedly transferred more than $2 million on behalf of the World Assembly of Muslim Youth, a Saudi-run organization that propagates Wahhabist fundamentalism, which isn’t part of the federation. Some of that money, according to the report, was sent by Mr. Zayat and another federation official, Ayman Sayed Ahmed Aly, to an Albanian charity, Taibah. Taibah’s Bosnia branch last year was designated a terrorist organization by the US. government. Its Albanian branch was raided last year by the government there."The constellation of accounts, money flows and persons indicate that the accounts in Germany of Ibrahim El-Zayat and Ayman Sayed Ahmed Aly were used for carrying out fundamentalist Islamic activities in Europe," the report said. Mr. Rawi [head of FIOE} said his federation has nothing to do with the activities of Mr. Zayat or Mr. Aly. "It is hard to prevent our members from working for charitable organizations," Mr. Rawi said.
Here is a translation of a German newspaper account from the GMBDR:
Ahmad al-Khalifa, eloquent preacher and head of the mosque in the Munich neighborhood of Freimann appeared rather monosyllabic Tuesday. Police and prosecutors arrived at his house and mosque and three other places in Munich and Garching at 6AM. The investigation is focused on Ahmad al-Khalifa and six other defendants, including the chairman of the Islamic Congregations in Germany (IGD), Ibrahim el Zayat. [ed.: the organization is related to the Muslim Brotherhood]. They are suspected of having contacts with Islamic terrorism. Special units of the police stormed in total 14 targets yesterday in Munich, Garching, Berlin, North Rhine-Westphalia and Belgium, including prayer rooms, mosques and numerous offices and homes. A police spokesperson says that extensive evidence was seized. The police did not give out names and addresses in the ongoing investigation. Ahmad al-Khalifa confirmed to Abendzeitung that the investigators were also by him and searched both his mosque and home. Ahmad von Dennffer, a Munich resident who was born in Aachen and converted to Islam, is also among the suspects. A third Munich resident is active in the Islamic youth organizations. None of the suspects were arrested yesterday. The men are suspected also of diverting funds from failed mosque building projects to their organization and misusing it for Islamic purposes. They are also suspected of obtaining school subsidies by fraud, forging bankruptcies and purchasing land through fraud.
A case worth following, and one that may give real insights into the Ikhwan structure in Europe and elsewhere.
What is striking is the stature of the institutions that were raided on suspicion of money laundering, criminal activities, acquisition of property under false pretenses, and aiding "Islamists" and violent Islamic jihadists.
One thing this shows is that, despite the constant protests to the contrary, at least the German prosecutors and those of several other nations, believe there is, in fact, a transnational Ikhwan organization. There is, but the Brotherhood usually denies its existence.
It also shows the wealth and power the group has acquired over time. It set up in Germany in the early 1960s, and has rolled on, virtually unchallenged and unexamined, since. This is not unlike the MB groups in the United States, as outlined by prosecutors in the Holy Land Foundation case, who have spread influence as a "mainstream" Islamic organization.
This case is particularly important because it goes to the intricate financial, real estate and mosque structure the MB has build over several decades in Europe, where it has often served as a gateway for those who join violent jihad.
According to the GMBDR:
Also, according to sources in Germany, the Belgian aspect of the investigation involves Al-Aqsa Belgium, the Belgian member organization of the Union of Good, a coalition of charities headed by global Muslim Brotherhood leader Youssef Qaradawi that is designated by the U.S. as raising funds for Hamas., a group directly linked to Yousef al-Qaradawi.
Another individual in the investigation is likely to be Ayman Aly who, along with Mr. El-Zayat is an officer of the Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe (FIOE), the umbrella organization for the Muslim Brotherhood in Europe. A 2005 Wall Street Journal article reported on transfers of money from the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY) to the Albania branch of Taibah International, an Islamic charity whose Bosnian branch was designated as a terrorist entity by both the U.S and the U.N in 2004. According to the Journal report, the money was transfered by two Mr. El-Zayat and Mr. Aly :
Federation officials also have helped channel money to Islamic groups in the Balkans. A key figure in this effort is Ibrahim el-Zayat, who as head of the Islamic Community of Germany, a founding group in the federation, is one of Europe’s most prominent Muslims. In 2002, German federal police launched an investigation of Mr. Zayat. According to copies of a report reviewed by the Journal, he allegedly transferred more than $2 million on behalf of the World Assembly of Muslim Youth, a Saudi-run organization that propagates Wahhabist fundamentalism, which isn’t part of the federation. Some of that money, according to the report, was sent by Mr. Zayat and another federation official, Ayman Sayed Ahmed Aly, to an Albanian charity, Taibah. Taibah’s Bosnia branch last year was designated a terrorist organization by the US. government. Its Albanian branch was raided last year by the government there."The constellation of accounts, money flows and persons indicate that the accounts in Germany of Ibrahim El-Zayat and Ayman Sayed Ahmed Aly were used for carrying out fundamentalist Islamic activities in Europe," the report said. Mr. Rawi [head of FIOE} said his federation has nothing to do with the activities of Mr. Zayat or Mr. Aly. "It is hard to prevent our members from working for charitable organizations," Mr. Rawi said.
Here is a translation of a German newspaper account from the GMBDR:
Ahmad al-Khalifa, eloquent preacher and head of the mosque in the Munich neighborhood of Freimann appeared rather monosyllabic Tuesday. Police and prosecutors arrived at his house and mosque and three other places in Munich and Garching at 6AM. The investigation is focused on Ahmad al-Khalifa and six other defendants, including the chairman of the Islamic Congregations in Germany (IGD), Ibrahim el Zayat. [ed.: the organization is related to the Muslim Brotherhood]. They are suspected of having contacts with Islamic terrorism. Special units of the police stormed in total 14 targets yesterday in Munich, Garching, Berlin, North Rhine-Westphalia and Belgium, including prayer rooms, mosques and numerous offices and homes. A police spokesperson says that extensive evidence was seized. The police did not give out names and addresses in the ongoing investigation. Ahmad al-Khalifa confirmed to Abendzeitung that the investigators were also by him and searched both his mosque and home. Ahmad von Dennffer, a Munich resident who was born in Aachen and converted to Islam, is also among the suspects. A third Munich resident is active in the Islamic youth organizations. None of the suspects were arrested yesterday. The men are suspected also of diverting funds from failed mosque building projects to their organization and misusing it for Islamic purposes. They are also suspected of obtaining school subsidies by fraud, forging bankruptcies and purchasing land through fraud.
A case worth following, and one that may give real insights into the Ikhwan structure in Europe and elsewhere.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Wednesday March 11, 2009
The Somali-US Experience
After years of debate over whether it could happen, started almost immediately after the 9/11 attacks, there is a clear case of a radical Islamist group actively and successfully recruiting inside the United States: the case of al Shabaab (the Youth) in Somalia.
The most famous case was that of Shirwa Ahmed, a 27-year-old college student from Minneapolis who blew himself up in Somalia on Oct. 29 in one of five simultaneous bombings attributed to al-Shabaab. The group has been designated a terrorist organization by the United States, and it has close links to al-Qaeda.
As the Washington Post reports, this is becoming an increasing worry to U.S. officials, in part because the use of a U.S. passport is so valuable.
Since November, the FBI has raced to uncover any ties to foreign extremist networks in the unexpected departures of numerous Somali American teenagers and young men, who family members believe are in Somalia. The investigation is active in Boston; San Diego; Seattle; Columbus, Ohio; and Portland, Maine, a U.S. law enforcement official said, and community members say federal grand juries have issued subpoenas in Minneapolis and elsewhere.
Officials are still trying to assess the scope of the problem but say reports so far do not warrant a major concern about a terrorist threat within the United States. But intelligence officials said the recruitment of U.S. citizens by terrorist groups is particularly worrisome because their American passports could make it easier for them to reenter the country.
This represents a movement toward the "Europeanization" of the Islamist threat in the United States, where terrorists recruit among the disasporas in an adopted country (or where the young people are second generation and feeling lost between two worlds.) The recruits, with the requisite language skills and knowledge of how society functions, are far easier to hide plain site than foreigners would.
While there have been American recruits in al Qaeda and elsewhere, most have been white American converts, rather than targeted members of an immigrant community. The fact that those recruited appear to have been radicalized in the United States, through mosques, individuals, or the Internet, shows there is a recruitment network.
One does not simply leave Minnesota for Somalia and accidentally hook up with a radical Islamist group in a country in chaos. The recruits have to know where and how to move, and have contacts that guide them along the way.
If, rather than becoming suicide bombers in Somalia, they are trained, further indoctrinated and choose to the United States, their entrance would be unremarkable. Using valid U.S. passports, simply unstamped at border crossings (which are virtually non-existent in Somalia, and can be avoided in many places), there is no reason to know who or what they are.
There are no doubt radicalizing factors among young people, primarily men in this case, that help push them down a certain path. But there are also many pull factors, which are often not acknowledged.
It is too simplistic to think that if one is unhappy and unemployed that one is driven to radical Islam. Rather, the counter-narrative of the radical groups has to be given some currency, through discussion groups, internet chat rooms, contact in the mosques etc.
It is this counter-narrative, one that explains (and this is the dangerous game the Muslim Brotherhood groups play) that a Muslim should be alienated from the society around him, should despise the society in which he lives because it is corrupt and sinful, etc., that provide the context for the person to channel his feelings.
The Somali case shows that the radicalization in the United States can work well enough to entice people to take up the jihad elsewhere. It is a short step to waging jihad back here.
The most famous case was that of Shirwa Ahmed, a 27-year-old college student from Minneapolis who blew himself up in Somalia on Oct. 29 in one of five simultaneous bombings attributed to al-Shabaab. The group has been designated a terrorist organization by the United States, and it has close links to al-Qaeda.
As the Washington Post reports, this is becoming an increasing worry to U.S. officials, in part because the use of a U.S. passport is so valuable.
Since November, the FBI has raced to uncover any ties to foreign extremist networks in the unexpected departures of numerous Somali American teenagers and young men, who family members believe are in Somalia. The investigation is active in Boston; San Diego; Seattle; Columbus, Ohio; and Portland, Maine, a U.S. law enforcement official said, and community members say federal grand juries have issued subpoenas in Minneapolis and elsewhere.
Officials are still trying to assess the scope of the problem but say reports so far do not warrant a major concern about a terrorist threat within the United States. But intelligence officials said the recruitment of U.S. citizens by terrorist groups is particularly worrisome because their American passports could make it easier for them to reenter the country.
This represents a movement toward the "Europeanization" of the Islamist threat in the United States, where terrorists recruit among the disasporas in an adopted country (or where the young people are second generation and feeling lost between two worlds.) The recruits, with the requisite language skills and knowledge of how society functions, are far easier to hide plain site than foreigners would.
While there have been American recruits in al Qaeda and elsewhere, most have been white American converts, rather than targeted members of an immigrant community. The fact that those recruited appear to have been radicalized in the United States, through mosques, individuals, or the Internet, shows there is a recruitment network.
One does not simply leave Minnesota for Somalia and accidentally hook up with a radical Islamist group in a country in chaos. The recruits have to know where and how to move, and have contacts that guide them along the way.
If, rather than becoming suicide bombers in Somalia, they are trained, further indoctrinated and choose to the United States, their entrance would be unremarkable. Using valid U.S. passports, simply unstamped at border crossings (which are virtually non-existent in Somalia, and can be avoided in many places), there is no reason to know who or what they are.
There are no doubt radicalizing factors among young people, primarily men in this case, that help push them down a certain path. But there are also many pull factors, which are often not acknowledged.
It is too simplistic to think that if one is unhappy and unemployed that one is driven to radical Islam. Rather, the counter-narrative of the radical groups has to be given some currency, through discussion groups, internet chat rooms, contact in the mosques etc.
It is this counter-narrative, one that explains (and this is the dangerous game the Muslim Brotherhood groups play) that a Muslim should be alienated from the society around him, should despise the society in which he lives because it is corrupt and sinful, etc., that provide the context for the person to channel his feelings.
The Somali case shows that the radicalization in the United States can work well enough to entice people to take up the jihad elsewhere. It is a short step to waging jihad back here.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Monday March 9, 2009
The FARC A Year After the Reyes Killing: Lesson Learned
Although a few days late, it is worth looking back at the year since Raul Reyes, the second in command of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) was killed in a permanent camp he had set up a few kilometers across the Ecuadorian border.
Not only was Reyes the first member of the FARC secretariat killed in more than 40 years of war, but he was well established enough to have 600 gigabytes of information on the hard drives and computers that were also captured. For an interesting look in Spanish at the international structure of the FARC see this interactive map in Semana magazine.
The result has been a severe weakening of the FARC, once the hemisphere's most feared guerrilla army that had, in recent years, drifted into terrorism, drug trafficking and kidnappings as its chief way of sustaining itself.
The documents provide an unprecedented look into the correspondence and inner workings of the FARC, its relationships with governments (Venezuela, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Libya etc.), its business development and aspirations, its ties to specific drug trafficking organizations, such as that of the Norther Valley, its political strategy and the creation of its front groups, and much more.
The first lesson is that the FARC, as a prototype of self-financing, non-state actors, had used the drug money to greatly expand its influence across Latin America and into Europe. These groups almost always find ways to link up with other groups, both religious and secular, because they need the same "shadow facilitators" to operate.
The spread of FARC operatives in recent years across Europe, Australia, Latin America and Canada is quite remarkable given that Marxism was generally believed to be dead. The financing of front groups, web sites, solidarity gatherings and "ambassadors" abroad could not have happened without the influx of drug money.
A second is that patient human intelligence, combined but not subservient to high-tech intelligence, generates successful operations. For decades the army killed or jailed captured FARC combatants, with no systematic debriefings or attempt to understand the movement. When that stopped, a much clearer picture of the organization began to emerge.
Systematic debriefings and profilings were combined with satellite phone intercepts and other high tech tools to gradually unravel the FARC's operational structure. Currently Jorge Briceño (AKA Mono Jojoy), the most effective combat commander, is reportedly ill, on the run and virtually incommunicado.
A third lesson is that humanitarian treatment of prisoners, at least those worn out by years of failed ideology and living in the jungle, pays dividends. Once it became clear to the FARC in the field that those captured were not killed or tortured, the stream of desertions grew to a flood, setting off a cycle of giving the army and police better intelligence, leading to more desertions.
And finally, it is clear that today's modern terrorist/criminal groups are far more effective when they have some state protection and/or sponsorship. The Taliban has Pakistan, the FARC has Venezuela and Ecuador as hospitable environments to resupply, move product, acquire weapons, meet safely etc.
The success against the FARC shows that coordinated efforts, good intelligence and timely outside aid (Plan Colombia, which, for all its multiple problems, delivered what the Colombian military needed) can reverse cycles that seem irreversible.
This should offer some lessons and some hope for Mexico, as well as lessons against terrorist/criminal groups operating elsewhere n the world.
Not only was Reyes the first member of the FARC secretariat killed in more than 40 years of war, but he was well established enough to have 600 gigabytes of information on the hard drives and computers that were also captured. For an interesting look in Spanish at the international structure of the FARC see this interactive map in Semana magazine.
The result has been a severe weakening of the FARC, once the hemisphere's most feared guerrilla army that had, in recent years, drifted into terrorism, drug trafficking and kidnappings as its chief way of sustaining itself.
The documents provide an unprecedented look into the correspondence and inner workings of the FARC, its relationships with governments (Venezuela, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Libya etc.), its business development and aspirations, its ties to specific drug trafficking organizations, such as that of the Norther Valley, its political strategy and the creation of its front groups, and much more.
The first lesson is that the FARC, as a prototype of self-financing, non-state actors, had used the drug money to greatly expand its influence across Latin America and into Europe. These groups almost always find ways to link up with other groups, both religious and secular, because they need the same "shadow facilitators" to operate.
The spread of FARC operatives in recent years across Europe, Australia, Latin America and Canada is quite remarkable given that Marxism was generally believed to be dead. The financing of front groups, web sites, solidarity gatherings and "ambassadors" abroad could not have happened without the influx of drug money.
A second is that patient human intelligence, combined but not subservient to high-tech intelligence, generates successful operations. For decades the army killed or jailed captured FARC combatants, with no systematic debriefings or attempt to understand the movement. When that stopped, a much clearer picture of the organization began to emerge.
Systematic debriefings and profilings were combined with satellite phone intercepts and other high tech tools to gradually unravel the FARC's operational structure. Currently Jorge Briceño (AKA Mono Jojoy), the most effective combat commander, is reportedly ill, on the run and virtually incommunicado.
A third lesson is that humanitarian treatment of prisoners, at least those worn out by years of failed ideology and living in the jungle, pays dividends. Once it became clear to the FARC in the field that those captured were not killed or tortured, the stream of desertions grew to a flood, setting off a cycle of giving the army and police better intelligence, leading to more desertions.
And finally, it is clear that today's modern terrorist/criminal groups are far more effective when they have some state protection and/or sponsorship. The Taliban has Pakistan, the FARC has Venezuela and Ecuador as hospitable environments to resupply, move product, acquire weapons, meet safely etc.
The success against the FARC shows that coordinated efforts, good intelligence and timely outside aid (Plan Colombia, which, for all its multiple problems, delivered what the Colombian military needed) can reverse cycles that seem irreversible.
This should offer some lessons and some hope for Mexico, as well as lessons against terrorist/criminal groups operating elsewhere n the world.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH
Thursday March 5, 2009
Why The Al Bashir Arrest Warrant is Important
Beyond the genocide and mass murder that Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir has presided over in his 20 years in office, it is important to remember what al-Bashir is: a radical Islamist imposing the type of sharia law and carrying out policies that most Islamists approve of.
While the International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for al-Bashir for Darfur (and most of the Muslim world has rallied to his defense, as they have remained silent and unmoved by the genocides his regime has perpetrated), that genocide was only one in a long series of actions taken in the name of Islam that have caused us all great harm.
In a case I testified in (now under appeal by the government of Sudan), the court in the Eastern District of Virginia accepted that Sudan "provided material support in the form of funding, direction, training and cover to Al-Qaeda, a worldwide terrorist organization whose operatives facilitated the planning and execution of the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole" in October 2000, while in the port of Aden, Yemen.
When he seized power in 1989 he did so as a self-proclaimed Islamist, in the company of Hassan al-Turabi," who is not only an extremely influential intellectual of the Muslim Brotherhood, but one of Osama bin Laden's earliest and most ardent backers.
The regime of al-Bashir is not an "ordinary" criminal regime, such as that of Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe or Charles Taylor in Liberia. Rather, it is a theologically-motivated regime that provided some of the important theological and financial support for radical Islamist movements around the world.
Al-Bashir and al-Turabi hosted not only al Qaeda, but Hamas, Hezbollah, whose members were able to enter without visas in order to foster revolutionary solidarity and networks.
Sudan, under al Bashir, became an Islamist terrorist Disneyland, where all could mix and mingle. The imposition of sharia law, the war against non-Muslims in the south, and the Darfur genocide, are all follow-ons to those years.
While al-Bahir and al-Turabi parted ways in a power struggle, their political/theological project was one and the same. It is worth recalling all the prestigious meetings, awards and boards that al-Turabi was a part of as he and al-Bashir opened their borders to a host of Islamist terrorist organizations in the 1990s.
(Among the banks al-Turabi helped found, and served on the board for a decade, is Dar al-Maal al Islami Trust, a premier Muslim banking institution.) According a Jan. 31, 2007 Wall Street Journal piece, which I can't find online, Overland Capital Group, a subsidiary of DMI, is under Justice Department investigation for possible tax violations. A prosecutor from the Counterterrorism division of DOJ was handling the case, the story said.
The al-Bashir regime facilitated the movement of hundreds of millions of dollars to the Bosnian Muslim movements in the early 1990s through the Third World Relief Agency (TWRA), run by Sudanese diplomats in Vienna, Austria.
TWRA, posing as a charity, provided the template for the fraudulent use of charities by al Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist groups around the world.
After 9/11, al-Bashir, sensing the shift in the winds, turned over some old and harmless intelligence on radical Islamists in Sudan and al Qaeda, to the United States. It was just enough to avoid serious sanctions.
Emboldened, the regime then went on to the Darfur atrocities while maintaining a chokehold at home, and reaping billions of dollars in new revenues as the Chinese poured into the Sudanese oil fields.
Al-Bashir represents the end product of what the Muslim Brotherhood proposes combined with what al Qaeda and violent Islamists seek: an Islamist government ruled by sharia law, with no separation at all between church (mosque) and state, and one that is willing to sponsor and facilitator of violent Islamists who carry out terrorist attacks.
While the International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for al-Bashir for Darfur (and most of the Muslim world has rallied to his defense, as they have remained silent and unmoved by the genocides his regime has perpetrated), that genocide was only one in a long series of actions taken in the name of Islam that have caused us all great harm.
In a case I testified in (now under appeal by the government of Sudan), the court in the Eastern District of Virginia accepted that Sudan "provided material support in the form of funding, direction, training and cover to Al-Qaeda, a worldwide terrorist organization whose operatives facilitated the planning and execution of the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole" in October 2000, while in the port of Aden, Yemen.
When he seized power in 1989 he did so as a self-proclaimed Islamist, in the company of Hassan al-Turabi," who is not only an extremely influential intellectual of the Muslim Brotherhood, but one of Osama bin Laden's earliest and most ardent backers.
The regime of al-Bashir is not an "ordinary" criminal regime, such as that of Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe or Charles Taylor in Liberia. Rather, it is a theologically-motivated regime that provided some of the important theological and financial support for radical Islamist movements around the world.
Al-Bashir and al-Turabi hosted not only al Qaeda, but Hamas, Hezbollah, whose members were able to enter without visas in order to foster revolutionary solidarity and networks.
Sudan, under al Bashir, became an Islamist terrorist Disneyland, where all could mix and mingle. The imposition of sharia law, the war against non-Muslims in the south, and the Darfur genocide, are all follow-ons to those years.
While al-Bahir and al-Turabi parted ways in a power struggle, their political/theological project was one and the same. It is worth recalling all the prestigious meetings, awards and boards that al-Turabi was a part of as he and al-Bashir opened their borders to a host of Islamist terrorist organizations in the 1990s.
(Among the banks al-Turabi helped found, and served on the board for a decade, is Dar al-Maal al Islami Trust, a premier Muslim banking institution.) According a Jan. 31, 2007 Wall Street Journal piece, which I can't find online, Overland Capital Group, a subsidiary of DMI, is under Justice Department investigation for possible tax violations. A prosecutor from the Counterterrorism division of DOJ was handling the case, the story said.
The al-Bashir regime facilitated the movement of hundreds of millions of dollars to the Bosnian Muslim movements in the early 1990s through the Third World Relief Agency (TWRA), run by Sudanese diplomats in Vienna, Austria.
TWRA, posing as a charity, provided the template for the fraudulent use of charities by al Qaeda, the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist groups around the world.
After 9/11, al-Bashir, sensing the shift in the winds, turned over some old and harmless intelligence on radical Islamists in Sudan and al Qaeda, to the United States. It was just enough to avoid serious sanctions.
Emboldened, the regime then went on to the Darfur atrocities while maintaining a chokehold at home, and reaping billions of dollars in new revenues as the Chinese poured into the Sudanese oil fields.
Al-Bashir represents the end product of what the Muslim Brotherhood proposes combined with what al Qaeda and violent Islamists seek: an Islamist government ruled by sharia law, with no separation at all between church (mosque) and state, and one that is willing to sponsor and facilitator of violent Islamists who carry out terrorist attacks.
POSTED BY DOUGLAS FARAH