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In recent years, groups in East Asia have gained adherents in the name of a holy war against U.S. institutions and influence.
©New York Times
© St. Petersburg Times, published October 10, 2001
WASHINGTON -- Terrorists tied to the al-Qaida network and based in the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia are among the likely targets of future covert and overt U.S. actions, the New York Times said Tuesday, citing U.S. officials it did not identify.
The officials gave no timetable, according to the newspaper; they said the global campaign against the groups linked to al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden was global and may last for years. But they said the East Asian groups have expanded their operations in recent years, exchanging money, personnel, materiel and experience with the bin Laden organization and its allies, and that they pose a clear and present danger to U.S. institutions overseas.
The groups have exploited political and economic instability in the Philippines, predominantly Roman Catholic, and in Indonesia, predominantly Muslim; in both countries street protests took place Tuesday outside the U.S. embassies against the airstrikes on Afghanistan. In recent years, the fundamentalist groups have gained adherents in the name of a holy war against U.S. institutions and influence.
The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, John Negroponte, told the Security Council on Monday that the United States, acting in self-defense after the Sept. 11 attacks, may take "further actions with respect to other organizations and other states."
Negroponte, a U.S. ambassador to the Philippines in the 1990s, named no groups or states. But administration officials have said repeatedly that bin Laden has adherents and allies all over the world, and that the war against them will range far beyond Afghanistan. East Asia, and particularly the Philippines, officials said, is an area where terrorists who have struck the United States before are known to have worked and planned their attacks.
The Abu Sayyaf group in the Philippines, which is on the official U.S. list of global terrorist organizations, has earned millions of dollars in ransom from kidnapping tourists, missionaries and resort workers.
Al-Qaida's financial connections in the Philippines include Islamic schools and charities through which millions of dollars have flowed to support the group and its allies across South and East Asia, officials said.
They include the International Islamic Relief Organization office and the Al Makdum university in Zamboanga, a city north of Basilan island. Bin Laden's brother-in-law, Mohammed Jalal Khalifa, was an administrator at both institutions. Neither is operating any longer, and Khalifa was arrested by the Saudi government after the Sept. 11 attacks.
Also since the attacks, Philippine intelligence officers have arrested two suspected Abu Sayyaf commanders and several men they described as foreigners carrying bombs. Malaysia has charged the son of a leading opposition politician as an Afghan-trained assassin aiming to overthrow the government. Indonesia has imprisoned two Malaysians in connection with a series of bombings.
In Indonesia, armed Islamic fundamentalist groups have received money, men and arms from the bin Laden group and its allies, officials said. One group, Laskar Jihad, they said, has received fighters from the Taliban. The other, the Islamic Defenders Front, is openly threatening violence against U.S. officials and organizations.
Some members of al-Qaida have moved through the international airport at Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, officials said. One of the Sept. 11 hijackers, Khalid al-Midhar, was videotaped at a terrorists' council in Kuala Lumpur in January 2000.
President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo of the Philippines said recently that "traces of relationship" exist between the Abu Sayyaf fighters and the plotters of the Sept. 11 attacks.
Arroyo has offered the United States her nation's airspace and the use of two large former U.S. military installations, Clark, an air base, and Subic, a naval base, for transit and staging operations.
President Bush is scheduled to discuss the counterterrorism campaign with the presidents of the Philippines and Indonesia and the prime minister of Malaysia in Shanghai on Oct. 19 at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting.