| India-Pakistan |
| New leads emerge on SIMI terror plans |
| 2008-04-02 |
| Students Islamic Movement of India leaders conducted at least three secret combat camps last year, police investigating a group of top SIMI leaders held in Indore believe. New recruits were taught basic jungle-craft, elementary marksmanship with air-rifles and the principles of bomb-making, police sources told The Hindu. SIMIs leading bomb-maker, Mumbai-based Mohammad Subhan alleged to have been linked to the perpetrators of the 2003 Gateway of India terror strike was the principal instructor at the camps. Investigators believe the first of these camps was held in the third week of April, 2007, near Hubli in Karnataka. The camp was organised by SIMIs south India chief, Hafiz Husain, and Shibli Peedical Abdul, an Idukki-born computer engineer who is alleged to have links with the Lashkar-e-Taiba terror cell which carried out the 2006 serial bombings in Mumbai. Operating under the code-name Adnan, Husain had overseen the large-scale expansion of SIMIs operations in Karnataka. A resident of Bijapurs Jamia Road area, Husain ran a network of religious front organisations through which SIMI drew much of its cadre. Abdul, who worked as a computer engineer with a multinational company in Bangalore, was among his key lieutenants. Several of their recruits are thought to have worked with Andhra Pradesh-based Lashkar operative Raziuddin Nasir in an abortive plot to stage bombings targeting western tourists in Goa. Among them was Yahya Kamakutty, a computer engineer drawn to SIMI through SARANI, a front organisation headed by Abdul. Nasir, Kamakutty and several other members of the cell were held in Bangalore last month. Police sources say similar training camps were held by SIMI at Mhow, Madhya Pradesh, in late October, 2007, and then near Kottayam, Kerala, in December, 2007. In each case, front organisations controlled by SIMI made arrangements for the camps, while cadre told their families they were travelling to retreats to further their religious education. Preparations Documents sized at SIMIs Indore safe-house suggest the training camps could have been preparatory exercises for a programme of continued selective violence agreed on at closed-door discussions between top SIMI leaders after the Hubli camp. SIMI planned to contact fraternal organisations, including the Taliban, to seek further resources for its campaign. SIMIs jihadist leadership also decided to resume publication of three jihadist magazines, Jihad: Fitr-e-Jamhooriyat [Jihad: The Commencement of Democracy] and Aaiye, Jannat ki Sair Karaein [Welcome to the Journey Into Paradise]. Publication of the magazines had been terminated by SIMIs last president, Shahid Badr Falahi, in an effort to distance the organisations leadership from jihadists. At Hubli, SIMIs leadership sought to outflank anti-jihad Islamists led by Falahi, by abolishing the central committee he controls. The leadership also forbade the organisation from participating in politics and, most important, abolished the age limit for membership allowing pro-jihad leader Safdar Nagori to remain in the organisation. Nagori, secretary-general of the organisation at the time of its proscription in 2001, was among the 13 SIMI leaders held in Indore last week. Wanted by police in half a dozen States, including Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Delhi, Nagori believed to be the principal architect of SIMIs turning to the jihad had evaded arrest since 2001. |
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| India-Pakistan |
| Indore raids net top SIMI leadership |
| 2008-03-30 |
| Police in Indore have arrested 10 leaders of the Students Islamic Movement of India in a dramatic intelligence-led operation that could help to unravel jihadist networks responsible for major terrorist bombings. Key among those arrested are general-secretary Safdar Nagori, the organisations top jihadist ideologue and organiser, and Shibly Peedical Abdul, a Kerala-born computer engineer sought by police ever since the Lashkar-e-Taiba-led 2006 serial bombings of Mumbai. Officials say side arms, cartridges and special jungle ropes used in combat-hardening courses for SIMI cadre were found in the safehouse. Police also recovered two computers and external hard drives which, they believe, may contain data on SIMIs structure, finances and strategy. Top leaders Wanted by police in six States, Nagori had evaded arrest ever since SIMI was proscribed in September 2001. Little is known about Nagoris activities over the last seven years, other than that he sustained SIMIs organisational networks in central and western India through front organisations such as the Tehreek Ihya-e-Ummat, or the Movement for the Revival of Muslims. Nagori is not thought to have personally carried out terrorist operations, but investigators believe that he provided logistics support and finance to SIMIs jihadist cells. Much of this is thought to have been sourced from West Asia-based supporters, Pakistan-based terror groups such as the Lashkar, and the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate. One of Nagoris most successful networks was run by Abdul, who worked as computer engineer in a multinational company before setting up an independent firm. Ehtesham Siddiqui, SIMIs Maharashtra general secretary and one of the alleged architects of the 2006 bombings, first told police that Abdul had a parallel life as one of top operatives of the proscribed Islamist group. Operating through a religious front-organisation, Abdul recruited over a dozen local men to SARANI men who set up the jihad cell discovered by police in Bangalore last month. He is believed to have participated in a conclave of SIMI members at Ujjain from July 4 to 7, 2006, where plans to revitalise the jihad in India were discussed. Several members of the terror cell that executed the 2006 Mumbai bombings, which claimed 209 lives and left 704 injured, participated in the Ujjain discussions among them computer technician and SARANI member Muzammil Sheikh, who is now being tried for his role, along with his brother, Faisal Sheikh, in the serial bombings. Unconfirmed reports suggest that one of the men arrested in Indore could be Mohammad Adnan, a key south India SIMI organiser. A resident of Bijapur in Karnataka, Adnan is alleged to have provided weapons and training to Abduls Bangalore jihad cell. However, sources in the Indore police said confirmation of the suspects identity was still awaited. Back to roots Wednesdays arrests could strengthen political Islamists within SIMI who have been struggling to bring the organisation back to its political roots. SIMI leaders grouped around its former president, Shahid Badr Falahi, long argued that the organisations turn to terror would be disastrous, and made persistent efforts to marginalise jihadists in its ranks. In January, 2006, SIMI members met in secret to discuss means to have the ban on the organisation revoked, and elected West Bengals Mohammad Misbah-ul-Islam their new president. Again, in January 2007, a senior New Delhi-based Jamaat-e-Islami leader hosted a meeting of the political Islamists to discuss strategies to distance SIMI from the jihadists. |
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