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Pak not doing enough against terrorist groups targeting India: US

02 Nov 2019

New York, Nov 2 (IANS) The US has said that Pakistan was not doing enough against terrorist groups operating from there that target India, and warned that those groups maintain their offensive capabilities.

"Pakistan did not take sufficient action against externally focused groups such as Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM), which continued to operate, train, organise, and fund raise in Pakistan," according to the annual Country Reports on Terrorism for 2018 that was released in Washington on Friday.

The report warned that "Pakistan-based LeT, which was responsible for the 2008 Mumbai attacks, and JeM maintained the capability and intent to attack Indian and Afghan targets".

"India continued to experience attacks, including by Pakistan-based terrorist organisations and tribal and Maoist insurgents," it said.

The five terrorist hits in India last year listed in the report included the Maoist improvised explosive device (IED) attack on a police vehicle in Chhattisgarh and another attack in Andhra Pradesh that killed Telugu Desam Party MLA Kidari Sarveswara Rao, and the killing of three people and the wounding of 20 in a grenade attack on Nirankaris by Sikh extremists.

It also mentioned the killing of journalist Shujaat Bukhari in Kashmir and the JeM attack on an army camp in Sunjuwan that killed six soldiers and a civilian.

The report drew attention to the risk of radicalisation and recruitment by terrorist organisations using social media.

"Indian government officials continued to be concerned over the use of the internet, including social media and messaging apps like WhatsApp, for terrorist recruitment and radicalisation and the fomenting of inter-religious tensions," the report said.

Rajiv Gauba, who was then the Home Secretary and other senior officers met representatives from global social media companies last year to review steps to prevent online terrorist recruitment and radicalisation, according to the report.

It said that cases of online terrorist radicalisation in southern India were reported throughout the year, including reports of some recruits being smuggled to Islamic State (IS) terrorities in Afghanistan.

According to the report, India disrupted an IS-inspired terrorist cell that was reportedly planning terrorist attacks in late 2018.

"India continued to apply pressure to detect, disrupt, and degrade terrorist organizations' operations within its borders," the report added.

(Arul Louis can be contacted at arul.l@ians.in and followed on Twitter @arulouis)

--IANS al/ksk/