South Asia Security Monitor: No. 216

June 6:

Last year, India and Israel's growing defense and strategic relationship included a $2.5 billion joint venture to manufacture medium-range surface-to-air missiles. Now, Delhi and Jerusalem appear to be exploring another facet of this partnership: unmanned aerial vehicles. India’s state owned Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) has agreed to send $100 million worth of light weight composite material to Israel for the construction of man-portable unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), reports India's Financial Express. The new light weight composites allow for the creation of UAVs capable of flying at 10,000 feet, well above hostile fire on the ground. The Indian Army reportedly is interested in procuring 1000 UAVs for force multiplication and reconnaissance missions.


July 9:

Over the past decade and a half, the notorious terrorist group Abu Sayyaf has accumulated approximately $30 million, one of Manila’s top counterterrorism cops has said. The Philippine Daily Enquirer reports that Chief Superintendent Rodolfo Mendoza told a recent conference on anti-terror financing in the Philippine capital that 97 percent of the group’s earnings have come from kidnap-for-ransom activities, and the rest from extortion, including the use of NGOs as fronts and collecting zakat (money which Muslims donate to mosques or charities for people in need). Abu Sayyaf’s activities, Mendoza said, have grown so large as to virtually incapacitate the local economies in three provinces. Abu Sayyaf also appears to increasingly be targeting shipping industries for extortion. The money thereby amassed is generally used to procure weapons, fund criminal operations, including bombings, and subsidize the families of the Abu Sayyaf leadership.


July 15:

The Straits Times reports that Thailand’s cabinet has decided to extend emergency rule in the country’s southern provinces for another three months because of ongoing unrest. The three provinces of Narathiawat, Pattani, and Yala, where 3,300 people have been killed by Muslim extremists to date, are currently under martial law.


July 16:

Violence is on the rise on the initial front of the War on Terror. “Attacks in eastern Afghanistan, which borders Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas, or FATA, are up 40 percent this year, according to US military sources," reports the Christian Science Monitor. "June was the deadliest month for US and NATO forces in Afghanistan since the 2001 invasion that toppled the Taliban government.” The reason appears to have everything to do with Coalition successes in Iraq; according to experts, U.S. and allied successes against al-Qaeda in Iraq has sparked a migration by fighters from the former Ba'athist state to Afghanistan and Pakistan, where they are joining Taliban forces. Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies says the conflict at the border of Afghanistan has become a crucial battleground, as foreign fighters trickle in across the border. A resurgence of the Taliban and the warm climate have also contributed to the upsurge in attacks.


July 18:

When Adm. Mike Mullen, the Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, visited Kabul earlier this month, he used the occasion to caution that militants are seeping through Pakistan’s porous border to join the Taliban in their fight against the Karzai government and Coalition forces. Mullen’s warning is well-placed. CBS News reports that “Afghan and Western officials say a key route for al Qaeda recruits is from Central Asia into northeastern Kunar and Nuristan provinces, where former U.S. intelligence officials suspect Osama bin Laden is hiding. Both provinces border Pakistan's Bajaur tribal area, where the Taliban hold sway and where the U.S. has targeted al Qaeda's No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahri.”

The influx of foreign fighters is especially evident because the tactical approach of attacks on U.S. forces has been more sophisticated in recent weeks. More concerning still is the foreign influence from Arab fighters from Iraq as they train Afghan Pashtuns in how to employ previously prohibited suicide bombing tactics.