ISIS central provided Marawi militants with funding – report
MANILA — The almost two-month old battle for Marawi may have been abetted by tens of thousands of dollars of financial support from the central command of the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, a report released yesterday said.
Central to this operation of linking local Islamist militants still entrenched in Marawi and the central command of the so-called ISIS in the Middle East is Dr. Mahmud Ahmad, a high-level militant leader from Malaysia, according to the report from the Institute for Policy of Analysis of Conflict.
Although ISIS central financial support to the local militants in the southern city was largely confined to periodic transfers of tens of thousands of dollars, it provides a crucial link between militants who are in retreat in the Middle East and those involved in the most serious security problem the government of President Rodrigo Duterte has faced so far.
Local funding, mainly from locals resentful of the “brutality” of Philippine security forces, also played a significant, if not more prominent, role in helping the siege of an Islamic city in the heart of Mindanao island.
“Funds for the Marawi operation came both directly from ISIS central as well as local sources,” said the IPAC report.
Duterte in May revealed that the government was able to detect money transfers from ISIS to Supt. Maria Cristina Nobleza, arrested in April for trying to help her alleged Abu Sayyaf lover to escape police and military operations in Bohol.
Duterte also claimed that drug money was helping fund terror activities, but the report based on visits to Mindanao, interviews with people and obtained messages from militants said that the president did not provide evidence for this.
According to the report, Ahmad facilitated the transfer of funds from Syria through Indonesia to the Philippines through Western Union several times between January and May this year.
“The transfers through Indonesia were likely used for the Marawi operations, but raise the question of what other transfers took place through Indonesia or other countries that have not yet been discovered,” it said.
For the first few transfers, Ahmad contacted AchmadSupriyanto alias Damar, a JAD member in Banten, Indonesia who had taken a short training course in Basilan May last year. JAD is an ISIS-lined Indonesian terrorist cell.
In January, Ahmad communicated with Damar to solicit his help in getting funds from Syria to the Philippines and gave him a Telegram account to contact.
Then the person told Damar to go to an East Java town to pick up the $10,000 from a man. After this, the Malaysian militant told him to send the money to several trusted recipients in the Philippine through Western Union.