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Filipinos, Asians Form Part of Taliban "Foreign Legion"
JAKARTA, Sept 27 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - A number of Filipino
mujahideen (Islamic fighters), as well as Indonesians, Moro and Malay fighters from Southeast Asia, may fight under the flag of the Taliban, sources said Thursday.
A Philippines news agency, the ABS-CBN news network, said that the mujahideen would fight for the Taliban if coalition forces led by the United States invade Afghanistan.
This possibility arose as Filipinos formed part of a Taliban army division under the command of a Sudanese national, according to a report submitted by Russia to the United Nations Security Council.
Thirty thousand Indonesians, and an undisclosed number of Malaysians, as well as fighters from Thailand, may be party to the anti-U.S. force.
"The eighth division of the Taliban under Mohammad Tarek, a Sudanese, includes, besides Pakistanis and Afghans, Chechens, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Filipinos, Bangladeshis, Kashmiris and nationals from Arab countries," the report said.
IslamOnline received separate reports indicating that Malaysians and Indonesians, Bangsamoro people and Pattani Muslims also form part of the Taliban army.
Mauritians and other Africans are also listed in the armies, a pan-global Islamic force formed to defend any Muslim country that would come under attack by "enemies of Islam".
Sources told IslamOnline that nationals from different countries willingly joined the pan-Islamic force believing that the Islamic world needed such a force.
Mujahideen from around the world have been trained in Afghanistan in the past 20 years. Before that, they were trained in Libya or Pakistan and Jordan, the source added.
"I took part in military training in Libya side by side with Palestinians and other nationals. The spirit was unique in the sense that we were all Muslims facing oppression from the non-Muslim regimes around us," Abdullah Mallik said.
"I did not have a chance to participate in any live action, however the training was important. I can still defend myself or join any units to defend any Muslim territory," said the 50-year-old who speaks French, Urdu, Arabic and English.
He confirmed that there were armies of Muslims training in several areas in Pakistan and Qatar, Afghanistan or Yemen. He said that it was justified for Muslims to have their own armies.
"We saw what happened in Egypt in 1973, Libya during the bombing by the [former U.S. president Ronald] Reagan government, Afghanistan after the invasion by Russia.
"Defending our territories is our genuine right," he concluded, before saying that the pan-Islamic force was not a "foreign legion" as news agencies termed it.
The Russian report, submitted on March 9, 2001, to the U.N. in New York, did not state where the eighth division was deployed.
The Russian report was in line with a U.N. resolution that, among others, requested information "on bases and training camps of international terrorists in Afghanistan."
The report said at least 50 Filipinos were recently trained in one of the 55 camps and bases being maintained in Afghanistan by Osama bin Laden, the prime suspect in the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington that claimed the lives of more than 7,000 people.
It noted that Filipino fighters were in Charasyaba, near the Afghan capital of Kabul, and were being "used for technical support and repair of weapons."
The Russian report did not indicate whether the Filipinos in Charasyaba were members of either the Abu Sayyaf or the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF).
But Sen. Rodolfo Biazon said in July that at least 50 suspected members of the Abu Sayyaf were undergoing training in Afghanistan.
During the Afghan war in the 1980s, Muslim Filipinos went to the Central Asian country to help fight the invading forces of the then Soviet Union.
One of the Afghan veterans was Abdurajak Janjalani, who later founded the Abu Sayyaf, one of the groups identified by U.S. President George W. Bush as having ties to bin Laden.
A number of MILF commanders also trained in Afghanistan and fought in the war.
Malaysia has recently arrested several locals suspected of belonging to a shadowy Mujahideen organization. The members of the group also had training in Afghanistan, the police said in Kuala Lumpur.
With additional reporting by Kazi Mahmood
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