Pak link to threats by al-Qaeda comes to fore

THE STATEMENTS AGAINST INDIA AND B’DESH SEEM TO HAVE BEEN ORCHESTRATED BY PAK DEEP STATE, SAY SECURITY PLANNERS

NEW DELHI: On Sunday, the proscribed al-Qaeda in the Sub-continent (AQIS) released a statement condemning the Bangladesh government for sentencing seven “innocent” persons to death for killings Islamophobes Shafiul Islam Lilion and Ananta Bijoy on charges of blasphemy. The release describes the Bangladesh government as “obedient agents of Hindutva menace” who did not bring the Islamophobes to justice but has put so-called “innocent” persons on death row.

A day later, AQIS threatened to conduct suicide bombings in Delhi, Bombay (Mumbai), Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat and teach a lesson to “Hindu terrorists” occupying India, a response to the comments of the now suspended spokesperson of the BJP who targeted the Prophet.

While the threat to India comes after the comments made by Nupur Sharma of the BJP (who has since been suspended), the government of Sheikh Hasina has been targeted over the sentencing of the murderers of Lilion and Bijoy, both done to death for alleged blasphemy in 2014 and 2015 respectively. Intriguingly, the latest blasphemy storm seems to have been orchestrated by social media handles in the Af-Pak region. The two statements are also indicative of the fact that there is a rise of al Qaeda in the Af-Pak region after the Taliban took over the country after the US exit in August 2021. Intelligence inputs indicate that al Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri is based in Afghanistan, though the ruling Taliban denies it and has conveyed to India that the global terrorist has taken shelter in neighbouring Iran. Tehran too denies the presence of Zawahiri in Iran and has conveyed that the al Qaeda leader is based in Afghanistan under the shelter of the ruling Taliban. Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden was killed by US troops in Pakistan in 2011.

While Muslim nations in West Asia and elsewhere have raised Sharma’s comments with New Delhi, it is a fact that radicalization is on the rise in the Af-Pak region with Taliban occupying

Kabul and giving shelter to al Qaeda. Just as the majority cadre of Islamic State of Khorasan Province (ISKP) come from Pakistan, the AQIS gets its cannon fodder from the country.

According to national security planners, the AQIS statements against both India and Bangladesh seem to have been orchestrated by the Pakistani deep state with the sole objective of making New Delhi and Dhaka targets of Islamists. An analysis of social media by intelligence agencies in the days after the controversy broke indicates that the agenda against India and Bangladesh is driven from Pakistan, with the use of unverified Twitter accounts and bots.

While India has conveyed its concerns about the rise of al Qaeda in the Af-Pak region to US interlocutors, the jihadists are at an advantage as the US and the west are focused on Ukraine. The rising economic instability in Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Maldives, and Nepal will lead to more public agitations, which could become fertile grounds of jihadists, analysts say. New Delhi, HT learns, has let it be known to Washington as well as Islamabad that what is most concerning is not that the Pakistani military establishment isn’t aware of this, but that it has not been able to deal with it.