Country Reports on Terrorism 2012 May 2013 ________________________________ United States Department of State Publication Bureau of Counterterrorism Released May 2013 Country Reports on Terrorism 2012 is submitted in compliance with Title 22 of the United States Code, Section 2656f (the “Act”), which requires the Department of State to provide to Congress a full and complete annual report on terrorism for those countries and groups meeting the criteria of the Act. COUNTRY REPORTS ON TERRORISM 2012 Table of Contents Chapter 1. Strategic Assessment Chapter 2. Country Reports Africa Overview, Trans-Sahara Counterterrorism Partnership, The Partnership for East African Regional Counterterrorism, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Chad, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Somalia, South Africa, South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda East Asia and Pacific Overview, China (Hong Kong and Macau), Indonesia, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Republic of Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand Europe Overview, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Denmark, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Kosovo, The Netherlands, Norway, Russia, Serbia, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, United Kingdom (Northern Ireland) Middle East and North Africa Overview, Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Israel (West Bank and Gaza), Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen South and Central Asia Overview, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan Western Hemisphere Overview, Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Venezuela Chapter 3. State Sponsors of Terrorism Overview Cuba, Iran, Sudan, Syria Chapter 4. The Global Challenge of Chemical, Biological, Radiological, or Nuclear (CBRN) Terrorism 2 Chapter 5. Terrorist Safe Havens (Update to 7120 Report) Terrorist Safe Havens Countering Terrorism on the Economic Front Multilateral Efforts to Counter Terrorism International Conventions and Protocols Matrix Long-Term Programs and Initiatives Designed to Counter Terrorist Safe Havens -Countering Violent Extremism -Capacity Building -Regional Strategic Initiative Support for Pakistan Collaboration with Saudi Arabia Broadcasting Board of Governors Initiatives: Outreach through Foreign Broadcast Media Basic Education in Muslim Countries Chapter 6. Terrorist Organizations Abdallah Azzam Brigades (AAB) Abu Nidal Organization (ANO) Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade (AAMB) Ansar al-Islam (AAI) Army of Islam (AOI) Asbat al-Ansar (AAA) Aum Shinrikyo (AUM) Basque Fatherland and Liberty (ETA) Communist Party of Philippines/New People’s Army (CPP/NPA) Continuity Irish Republican Army (CIRA) Gama’a al-Islamiyya (IG) Hamas Haqqani Network (HQN) Harakat ul-Jihad-i-Islami (HUJI) Harakat ul-Jihad-i-Islami/Bangladesh (HUJI-B) Harakat ul-Mujahideen (HUM) Hizballah Indian Mujahedeen (IM) Islamic Jihad Union (IJU) Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) Jaish-e-Mohammed (JEM) Jemaah Ansharut Tauhid (JAT) Jemaah Islamiya (JI) Jundallah Kahane Chai Kata’ib Hizballah (KH) Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) Lashkar e-Tayyiba Lashkar i Jhangvi (LJ) Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) 3 Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM) National Liberation Army (ELN) Palestine Islamic Jihad – Shaqaqi Faction (PIJ) Palestine Liberation Front – Abu Abbas Faction (PLF) Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) Al-Qa’ida (AQ) Al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) Al-Qa’ida in Iraq (AQI) Al-Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) Real IRA (RIRA) Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) Revolutionary Organization 17 November (17N) Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party/Front (DHKP/C) Revolutionary Struggle (RS) Al-Shabaab (AS) Shining Path (SL) Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP) United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC) Chapter 7. Legislative Requirements and Key Terms 4 Chapter 1. Strategic Assessment The al-Qa’ida (AQ) core, under the direction of Ayman al-Zawahiri, has been significantly degraded as a result of ongoing worldwide efforts against the organization. Usama bin Laden’s death was the most important milestone in the fight against AQ, but there have been other successes – dozens of senior AQ leaders have been removed from the fight in the Afghanistan- Pakistan region. Ilyas Kashmiri, one of the most capable AQ operatives in South Asia, and Atiya Abdul Rahman, AQ’s second-in-command, were killed in Pakistan in 2011. AQ leaders Abu Yahya Al-Libi and Abu Zaid al-Kuwaiti were killed in 2012. As a result of these leadership losses, the AQ core’s ability to direct the activities and attacks of its affiliates has diminished, as its leaders focus increasingly on survival. Leadership losses have also driven AQ affiliates to become more independent. The affiliates are increasingly setting their own goals and specifying their own targets. As avenues previously open to them for receiving and sending funds have become more difficult to access, several affiliates have engaged in kidnapping for ransom. Through kidnapping for ransom operations and other criminal activities, the affiliates have also increased their financial independence. While AQ affiliates still seek to attack the “far enemy,” they seem more inclined to focus on smaller scale attacks closer to their home base. Both al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and al-Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) have taken steps to seize land and impose their brutal authority over local populations. The AQ core still has the ability to inspire, plot, and launch regional and transnational attacks from its safe haven in Western Pakistan, despite its leadership losses. Along with AQ, the Afghan Taliban, the Haqqani Network, Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan, and other like-minded groups continue to conduct operations against U.S., Coalition, Afghan, and Pakistani interests from safe havens on both sides of the Afghanistan/Pakistan border. Other South Asian terrorist organizations, including Lashkar e-Tayyiba (LeT), cite U.S. interests as legitimate targets for attacks. LeT, the group responsible for the 2008 Mumbai attacks, continues to pose a serious threat to regional stability. In Yemen, the fight against AQAP is a work in progress, but the trend lines are positive. Yemeni forces have had success pushing AQAP out of its southern strongholds over the last year, leading AQAP to turn increasingly to asymmetric tactics in a campaign of bombings and targeted assassinations against government targets, pro-government tribal militias known as Popular Committees and their leaders, soldiers, civilians, and foreign diplomatic personnel. After more than two decades of strife, autumn 2012 marked the beginning of political transition in Somalia, with a new provisional constitution, parliament, and president. These are hopeful signs of a new era in this long-suffering country. This success was made possible because Somali National Forces and the AU Mission in Somalia – with strong financial support and training from the United States and Western partners – expelled al-Shabaab from major cities in southern Somalia. Though al-Shabaab is carrying out attacks against the new government, it is fragmented by dissension and much weakened. 5 Though the AQ core is on a path to defeat, and its two most dangerous affiliates have suffered serious setbacks, tumultuous events in the Middle East and North Africa have complicated the counterterrorism picture. The dispersal of weapons stocks in the wake of the revolution in Libya, the Tuareg rebellion, and the coup d’état in Mali presented terrorists with new opportunities. The actions of France and African countries, however, in conjunction with both short-term U.S. support to the African-led International Support Mission to Mali and the long-term efforts of the United States via the Trans-Sahara Counterterrorism Partnership, have done much to roll back and contain the threat. In Libya, the security vacuum in the aftermath of the 2011 revolution provided greater opportunity for terrorists to operate. This vacuum, combined with the weakness of Libya’s nascent security institutions, allowed violent extremists to act, as we saw too clearly on September 11 in Benghazi, when J. Christopher Stevens, the U.S. Ambassador to Libya, and three staff members, died during attacks on U.S. facilities. In Syria, AQI seeks to establish a long-term presence under the pseudonym of al-Nusrah Front. The Nusrah Front has denounced the Syrian Opposition Coalition’s founding, rejected the vision statement that the opposition issued in Cairo, and says it is fighting to establish an Islamic caliphate encompassing the entire Levant. In Gaza, a sharp increase in the number of rocket attacks launched by Hamas and other Gaza- based violent extremist groups led Israel to launch Operation Pillar of Defense in November 2012. During the course of the eight day operation, Israeli forces targeted more than 1,500 terrorist sites. Since the Egypt-brokered November 21 ceasefire, the United States has engaged with our Egyptian and Israeli counterparts to strengthen and sustain the peace. In West Africa we are seeing a loosely-organized collection of factions known as Boko Haram (BH) – some of them with ties to AQIM – exploiting the grievances of northern