How much should India involve itself in the global war against ISIS
In the context of Defence Minister of India, Manohar Parrikar stating that India would join the war against the ISIS if it was found under the flag of the United Nations, it would be interesting to see the world wide recruitment spree of this dreaded outfit.
Both India and Pakistan had stayed away from the global coalition which is fighting the ISIS for a variety of reasons.
The primary concern for both countries which house a large number of Shia Muslims is that any contribution they make to the global coalition against the ISIS could lead to a sectarian clash back home.
Speaking of India, the ISIS concern is there no doubt, but when compared to the rest of the countries, the statistics are far better.
Here is a look at the area wise recruitment where the ISIS is concerned.
8,240
from
West
Asia,
8,000
from
the
Maghreb,
5,000
from
Western
Europe,
4,700
from
the
former
Soviet
republics,
900
from
South
East
Asia,
875
from
the
Balkans
and
280
from
North
America.
Tunisia
(6,000),
Saudi
Arabia
(2,500),
Russia
(2,400),
Turkey
(2,100)
and
Jordan
(2,000).
From
India
the
official
figure
stands
at
23
while
the
unofficial
statistic
suggests
50.
From
Pakistan
unofficially
the
number
stands
at
330
while
the
official
figure
is
70.
What India should focus on?
Former officer with the Research and Analysis Wing, V Balachandran tells OneIndia that there is a need for more ground intelligence in addition to monitoring the social media.
While
the
power
of
the
Islamic
State's
social
media
outreach
is
undeniable,
it
appears
that
it
helped
prepare
the
ground
for
persuasion,
rather
than
to
force
a
decision
which
they
do
through
ground
activists.
ISIS
constantly
exhorts
them
to
perform
hijrah
to
Syria
with
their
families.
Some
of
them
were
on
student
visas.
Over 140 of them had no radical history and wanted to be good Muslims believing that the IS caliphate offered them a life of piety that would increase their chances of rewards in afterlife.
Some radicalised youths who could not travel to Syria were prepared to carry out attacks at home to punish their governments, Balachandran says.
Our agencies should study the January 2015 US Congressional Research (CRS) Report on "Islamic State Crisis and US Policy" and also the Soufan Group's "Foreign Fighters - an Updated Assessment of the Flow of Foreign Fighters into Syria and Iraq"released on December 9.
The CRS report says that US has been diplomatically coordinating since March 2014 with European, North African and Middle East partners to prevent foreign fighters joining the IS as 16,000 foreign volunteers from 90 countries had traveled to Syria since January 2012.
The Soufan Group which is one of the most active security forecast groups depends upon ground surveys rather than media skimming. It has now brought out a new report giving updated details of foreign fighters with ISIS.
The number in their June 2014 report stood at 12,000 from 81 countries. Nineteen months later they found that it had grown to 27,000-31,000 from 86 countries.
Returning jihadis were 20-30 per cent, presenting a significant challenge to security and law enforcement agencies as we saw in Paris. The report provides new ground realities which would be useful to adopt realistic counter-narratives to stem the flow.
Besides, online propaganda, they found several "hotbeds" for recruitment like Lisleby district of Fredrikstad in Norway, Bizerte and Ben Gardane in Tunisia, Derna in Libya, the Pankisi Gorge in Georgia and the Molenbeek district of Brussels.