Washington: Pakistan is home to at least 12 groups designated as “foreign terrorist organisations” by the US, including five of them being India-centric like the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed, according to the latest congressional report on terrorism. US officials have identified Pakistan as a base of operations or target for numerous armed and non-state militant groups, some of which have existed since the 1980s, the independent Congressional Research Service (CRS) said in the report.
The report, “Terrorist and Other Militant Groups in Pakistan”, released by the bipartisan research wing of Congress on the eve of the Quad summit hosted by President Biden last week, said these groups operating in Pakistan can be broadly categorised into five types - globally-oriented, Afghanistan-oriented, India- and Kashmir-oriented, domestically-oriented and sectarian (anti-Shia).
“LeT was responsible for major 2008 attacks in Mumbai,” the CRS said. JeM was founded in 2000 by Kashmiri militant leader Masood Azhar and was designated as an FTO in 2001. Along with LeT, it was responsible for the 2001 attack on the Indian parliament, it said. JeM also has openly declared war on the US, it noted. Harakat-ul Jihad Islami was formed in 1980 in Afghanistan and was designated as an FTO in 2010. After 1989, it redirected its efforts toward India. “With an unknown strength, HuJI today operates in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh and India, and seeks annexation of Kashmir into Pakistan,” the report said. Hizb-ul Mujahideen, formed in 1989 was designated as an FTO in 2017. It is one of the largest and oldest militant groups operating in J&K. Among other terror groups operating from Pakistan are al-Qaida, CRS said.
CRS said as per the US state department’s Country Reports on Terrorism 2019, Pakistan has “continued to serve as a safe haven for certain regionally focused terror groups,” and has “allowed groups targeting Afghanistan ... as well as India ...to operate from its territory”. The state department assessed that “Islamabad has yet to take decisive actions against India- and Afghanistan-focused militants”. CRS reports are not an official report of the Congress.
