Terror Threat haunts

Threat from Islami terror groups has begun to spread its tentacles. The recent exposure of a conspiracy hatched in Europe suggests that these groups are now preparing not only to strike in the sub continent but also the advanced nations of Europe. This obviously now calls for greater sharing of intelligence and cooperation in order to meet the challenge. If the terrorists are allowed to succeed even partially then their strength will grow manifold and with it the threat to the rest of the world.

by SHIBANI DASGUPTA

A report culled by national intelligence in United States of America has gone public about fears of international terror organisation Al Qaeda gaining ground and popularity from its refuge in North West Pakistan.

Understandably, nobody is amused or happy about the finding, spreading as it does, its tentacles in North East India, South East Asia and Spain. According to information emanating from Barcelona in the second week of February, where terrorism suspects gathered in a largely Pakistani neighborhood, they were joined by, as suspected by Spanish police a freshly groomed and trained in acts of terrorism and disruption.

It was suspected that the young man had come from Pakistan borderlands where the leadership of Al Qaeda is said to have regrouped. The plan worked out included a wave of spectacular attacks-coordinated suicide bombings would begin in Barcelona’s vast subway system and then at suitable intervals through Portugal, Germany, France and Britain unless certain specific demands were met.

It is not necessary that a bomber will only be a bomber. Till his time for an assignment comes, the young recruit may also act as an informer for French intelligence in the no man’s land of Waziristan in Pakistan.

In this particular case, after the recruit got word to his handlers of an impending attack, Spain’s military police swooped into the primarily Pakistani neighborhood in the early hours of a January morning and arrested 14 men. Policemen in Spain unraveling the case say it demonstrated the growing threat of terrorist activity of those migrating to continental Europe from Pakistan.

According to media reports that appeared in New York Times, the largely Pakistani cell formed quickly in Barcelona with support and perhaps direction from the tribal areas of Pakistan. According to the arrest warrant in the case, three suicide bombing suspects arrived in Spain in the last four months and the bomb making suspect had recently spent a good five months in Pakistan.

With Spain preparing for elections in March, the suspected plot was an eerie echo of a similar March 11, 2004 Madrid transit bombings, which had killed 191 people just days before the last elections.

Spain’s highest antiterrorism magistrate Balthazar Garzon has said in my opinion the jihadi threat from Pakistan is the biggest emerging threat we are facing in Europe. Pakistan is an ideological and training hotbed for jehadists, and they are being exported here.

The threat has been felt elsewhere too. It may be recalled that two suicide bombers who attacked London’s transit system in 2005 had trained at a camp in Pakistan Four of the five men convicted last April in a plot o blow up targets using fertilizer bombs were of Pakistani origin and trained at a camp there.

The US intelligence report goes on to state that the Al Qaeda and Taliban elements which have moved beyond Pakistan’s tribal areas are threatening the country’s survival, a top US intelligence official has said in an unusually strong warning, asserting that only the Army has the strength to check the menace. It also added that the Pakistani leadership was taking steps to be more aggressive in getting control of the situation.

In India the situation is no better. Reports have emerged that Al Qaeda’s fraternal outfit in India Lashkar-e-Toiba have over the years untiringly created situations and atmosphere to create unrest over the years.

The media in Uttar Pradesh have reported that in the course of statewide raids after the arrest of six Lashkar-e-Toiba terrorists and a revelation that they had planned an attack on Indian Space Research Organisation in Bangalore in 2005 before changing their plans and targeting Indian Institute of Science.

Recent reports from intelligence agencies have pointed out that South India is becoming a hub for terrorist activity and Hubli in Karnataka has become the base of operations. The arrest of the alleged Let Militants in Uttar Pradesh has given vital clues about some people manning sleeper cells of terror outfits in Mumbai.

The anti-terrorism squad is now verifying the back-ground and credentials of these people and several ATS teams have fanned out to do search and combing operations. A safe house has been traced in Mumbai which was to function as control room cum arsenal for operations in Mumbai and it was to be their last meeting place after the module had succeeded in triggering off blasts.

There are observations from security experts how Ministry of Finance has refused to clear a project to overhaul and implement a project that would allow the hiring of an estimated 140 personal needed to staff a new organisation to coordinate counter-terrorism operations have met with a still birth.

It may be recalled that plan to create the multi agency center an overall hub for India’s counter-terrorism efforts were first proposed by a high-level committee set up to study intelligence reforms in the aftermath of the Kargil war.

Chaired by former chief of Research and Analysis Wing Girish Saxena, the committee included National Security Advisor M K Narayanan, had carried out for the first time a full appraisal of India’s intelligence services since 1947.