Jihadists get a safe sanctuary… WHAT TALIBAN’S RISE MEANS FOR T&T

INTERNATIONAL military and diplomatic experts are saying Taliban-controlled Afghanistan would provide a safe haven and training ground for Islamic jihadists. 

Trinidad and Tobago was confirmed a few years ago as having, per capita, the largest number of recruits to the Islamic State (ISIS) caliphate of Syria and Iran. 

For those reasons, the takeover of Afghanistan by the military group Taliban should be of serious concern to Trinidad and Tobago. 

T&T conducted a public enquiry into the 1990 attempted coup 24 years after the bloody event and has still not implemented important recommendations of the investigators. 

That probe found a major failing by intelligence agencies.  

With the takeover of Afghanistan, Islamic terrorism has gotten a huge boost, according to experts, and it is expected that the Taliban would quickly move to destabilise Pakistan and then spread its terror campaign. 

More than that, Taliban leaders are strongly aligned to Russia, China and Iran, three militarily strong countries that have designs on the Caribbean (See our related earlier story). 

China has already announced its readiness for “friendly relations” with the Taliban. 

The Chinese authorities have been wooing the Rowley Government with interest-friendly loans and with grants and gifts, aimed at developing close strategic ties in the Southern Caribbean.   

T&T is a well-known feeding ground for jihadists. 

Remember Shane Crawford? 

In 2013, Crawford – who had been accused of committing a double murder in Central Trinidad – fled and joined ISIS, where he was radicalised. 

He was among a large number who took up arms for ISIS, making T&T a primary international recruitment source for that fundamentalist guerrilla group. 

A critical study said the ISIS recruit from T&T had “a profound spiritual disaffection” with this country, and saw it is “sexually permissive, corrupt and lacking in any real value – a sort of anti-paradise.” 

To some, that state of affairs still exists, one analyst said. 

Recruits from T&T are said to be extremely well networked; “everyone was connected to everyone else,” the report said about the T&T ISIS cohort. 

American experts say the Taliban regime in Afghanistan could be seen as a sanctuary for extremists. 

Former United States Defence Secretary Leon Panetta said the Taliban “will provide a safe haven for Al-Qaeda, for ISIS, and for terrorism in general.” 

Afghanistan’s former representative to the United Nations Ghulam Isaczai stated that “the Taliban are assisted by transnational terrorist networks.” 

Isaczai foresees “deliberate acts of barbarism.” 

Current US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said he would reassess the potential for terrorist groups ISIS and Al-Qaeda reconstituting in Afghanistan. 

General Mark Milley, Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, aired similar concerns in a discussion with senators of that country. 

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said western countries must unite to prevent Afghanistan becoming a haven for international terrorist groups.  

Other analysts feel the Taliban’s rule of Afghanistan according to strict Sharia Islamic law would attract jihadists from the western world. 

Because of the size and topography of Afghanistan, terrorist training could be difficult to detect, according to military experts. 

BBC News has reported that “hiding places for (terrorist training) now opening up in the country’s ungoverned spaces are a tempting prize, especially for ISIS militants looking to find a new base…” 

But T&T recruits to the Taliban may find it much more difficult to leave than their ISIS predecessors were able to do. 

Afghanistan under Taliban would be considered an international pariah; only Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates supported the government of 1996 to 2001. 

The remoteness of training camps and the Taliban’s diplomatic isolation could make it difficult for jihadists to leave Afghanistan.  

Several T&T fighters and their families who had joined the ISIS genocidal movement and survived the armed conflict eventually left Syria and Iraq. 

The Taliban morale booster for jihadists could well entice recruits from T&T, which was proportionally the best source of ISIS enrolment.