Washington: The Islamic State has recently claimed to have started its own currency by minting gold coins, according to a newly released video. In the documentary styled footage, the group presented its new currency, claiming to have started minting and circulating its gold coins.
In the video entitled “The Rise of the Khilafah and the Return of the Gold Dinar” the ISIS shows the smelting of gold, silver and copper coins. The ISIS currency comes in several denominations of gold, silver and copper, and are imprinted with Islamic symbols, “completely void of human and animal images in accordance with Shariah law,” according to the narrator in the propaganda video. The reverse side of one coin shows seven wheat stalks, “representing the blessing of spending in the path of Allah,” says the narrator. The video, narrated in English with Arabic subtitles, begins with an extensive analysis on “the capitalist financial system of enslavement, underpinned by a piece of paper called the Federal Reserve dollar note,” and the corruption that allowed for the American destruction of the monetary system.
If the coins are real, they are unlikely to be of much use as accurate estimates of the value are impossible given that the weight of the metal is unclear and there is no international exchange rate for an unrecognised currency. It is also unclear on how Isis would mint enough coins to replace national currencies in its strongholds also with all photos so far appearing to show the same two coins. None of the metals are mined in Iraq or Syria which lead experts to believe any precious metals the group possesses have been purchased, stolen or looted in other forms and melted down.
It is attempting to set its own exchange rates for one gold dinar at $139 (£88), a five dinar coin at $694 (£440), three silver dirhams ranging between $1 (64p) and $9 (6), and two copper coins at a few pennies each.
Last year , ISIS had announced its plans to mint its own currency in gold, silver and copper and had stated that the aim of the currency was to stay away from the “tyrant's financial system”. The group is considered to be one of the richest militant organisations that extract income from theft, oil smuggling, extortion and human trafficking.
