Al Qaeda nails Pakistan ISI on jihadi connection

New Delhi: In its recently released “code of conduct” document, the Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) has said it will work together with jihadi groups from India, Bangladesh and Myanmar, which are “independent from intelligence agencies’ influence”. By leaving out Pakistan, the AQIS has only underscored the extant relationship between the Pakistani spy agency ISI and jihadi outfits in that country.  

In a section titled “Our Strategy Concerning Jihadi Groups”, the AQIS says: “We will work with jihadi groups (that are independent from intelligence agencies’ influence) in India, Bangladesh, and Arakan (Burma)”.

A dominant section of ISI officials are known to be working in close tandem with outfits like the Lashkar-e-Tayyaba, the Taliban and Hizbul Mujaheedeen, and helping them with weapons, finances and logistics, something Pakistan has been denying all this time.

In a clarion call to Pakistan-based jihadi outfits, the AQIS asks the Pak-based jihadis to stop depending on the intelligence agencies, ostensibly meaning the ISI, when it says: “We call on all jihadi groups working under anti-Shariah intelligence agencies in any place to end their dependence on them. This is the only way to help the oppressed Muslim, and to make real progress towards implementation of Shariah, because history bears witness that the militaries of taghoot, in the end, destroy fruits of these mujaheedeens’ jihad. The Kashmiri jihad is a clear example of this.”

In Islamic theology, the word ‘taghoot’ means idolatry. Interestingly, the AQIS, in a conciliatory tone, also offers the olive branch to other jihadi outfits by urging them to join forces when it says: “The Jama’ah also invites brother jihadi groups to conduct combined military operations in accordance with its Code of Conduct. In this regards, the Jama’ah would open-heartedly cooperate with every organisation for the sake of supremacy of Islam and for the strengthening of jihad.”

“We are trying to unite all schools of thought of Ahl us Sunnah wa al-Jamaa’ah in the region under the banner of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan for the implementation of Shariah and against anti-Shariah forces, to get them out of differing about secondary issues and unite on the collective and fundamental matters of religion — which will make this Ummah a well-fortified wall in the face of the enemies of Shariah,” it said.

Set up in September 2014, the AQIS is headed by the fugitive Asim Umar alias Shanul Haque, a resident of Deepa Sarai, Sambhal, in Uttar Pradesh. Umar had left India for Pakistan in 1995 and had initially joined the Harkat ul Mujahideen.