After Pune, Details Emerge on the Karachi Project and Its Threat to India
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APRIL 2010 . VOL 3 . ISSUE 4 22,000 fighters deployed by the ChRI Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and even the After Pune, Details more than a decade ago.28 Foreign West.31 Emerge on the Karachi fighters are also in short supply. Since 2003, jihadist syndicates have These developments pose complex Project and its Threat to eschewed the Caucasus in favor of more challenges for Russian officials. A India promising fronts in Afghanistan and diffuse insurgency is more difficult Iraq.29 Yet while the aggregate number to defeat using conventional military By Animesh Roul of militants in the North Caucasus has means. A delocalized insurgency, in decreased, the relative intensity and turn, is more likely to attract disaffected the 14 months of calm after the extensity of their operations remains Muslims from other regions. In this November 2008 Mumbai terrorist relatively consistent. sense, the decade-long devolution from attacks were shattered when militants tariqat to jama`at produced a movement bombed the Indian city of Pune on This consistency reflects longstanding that is more ethical than political—one February 13, 2010. The attack targeted flaws in Russia’s counterinsurgency preoccupied with idealized notions a popular German bakery located in strategy. Characterized by corrupt of violence rather than the creation of the Koregaon Park area. The bakery is regional leaders, a repressive security social and political institutions. situated near a Hindu spiritual center apparatus, and two decades of (Osho Rajneesh) and a Jewish cultural protracted civil strife, conditions in These attributes indicate chronic center (the Chabbad House) that are the North Caucasus present fertile weakness. The Caucasian Front cannot frequented by foreigners and affluent ground for Umarov’s appeals to pan- seize and hold territory. It cannot Punekars. Seventeen people were killed Islamic solidarity. The operations mobilize sustained indigenous support. in the bombing, including five foreign tempo also reflects emerging It cannot even articulate a coherent nationals.1 Among the injured were recruitment patterns. Although exiled vision of the political future. Reduced Iranian, Sudanese, Taiwanese, German, ChRI leaders such as Akhmed Zakayev to a self-styled virtual emirate, it Yemeni and Nepalese citizens. Forensic have openly denounced Umarov’s lacks the attributes associated with investigations into the incident suggest Salafist agenda, the Caucasian Front successful insurgencies. This weakness that the militants used a remotely- now attracts a new generation of Islamic will not translate into a more passive detonated improvised explosive device militants from across the former Soviet or quiescent adversary, however. By comprising a mixture of ammonium Union. engaging in provocative terror, Umarov nitrate, RDX explosives and petroleum actively courts violent reprisal. The hydrocarbon oil.2 The life and death of Said Buryatsky more repressive the Russian response, is a case in point. Born Aleksandr the more radicalized the Caucasus will The bakery was likely targeted because Tikhomirov in the western Siberian become. Against this backdrop, the it is located in a crowded area and more city of Ulan-Ude, the ethnic Buryat Moscow metro bombings suggest the vulnerable to attack. It was a popular abandoned his region’s Buddhist same kind of “vexation and exhaustion” meeting place, and the timing of the blast heritage and converted to Islam at age strategies adopted in other theaters coincided with the peak evening hours 15. In 2008, he joined the Caucasian along the umma’s cultural and geographic when foreigners and Indian visitors Front, using videos, blogs, and other periphery.32 Unable to use force to frequent the area. It is likely that the social networking media to document achieve political ends, Umarov has militants selected the bakery either due his experiences as a guerrilla.30 In embraced force as an end unto itself. to heightened security measures at the 2009, he helped reconstitute Riyadus- respective spiritual and cultural centers Salikhin, launching a series of suicide Christopher Swift is an attorney and a nearby, or as a last minute change in operations targeting Ingush President Ph.D. candidate in the Department of strategy based on the size of the crowd Yunus-Bek Yevkurov. By the time Politics & International Studies at the at the restaurant. of his death in 2010, Buryatsky had University of Cambridge. His research gained international prominence examines convergence and divergence After the attack, a flurry of conflicting as an impassioned advocate of jihad, in contemporary Islamic militancy, with reports surfaced about the terrorist with a following among self-identified an emphasis on the relationship between groups responsible for the blast as “internet mujahidin” in Afghanistan, al-Qa`ida and indigenous Muslim multiple unknown groups claimed credit insurgencies. He has conducted fieldwork for the operation. Suspicion, however, 28 “Federalniim cilam v. Chechne protivostoyat 22 tiic. in regions including Afghanistan and the remains on Pakistan-based Lashkar-i- boevikov,” Cyr.ru, November 4, 1999. North Caucasus. Tayyiba (LT) and its Indian homegrown 29 Despite the presence of foreign fighters in the North affiliate, the Indian Mujahidin (IM). Caucasus during the first and second Russo-Chechen Details continue to emerge suggesting wars, geographic isolation, linguistic barriers, and strong that the plot may have been part of the border controls limited substantial Arab infiltration. See LT’s so-called “Karachi Project.” The Cerwyn Moore and Paul Tumelty, “Foreign Fighters and the Case of Chechnya: A Critical Assessment,” Studies in 31 Paul Quinn-Judge, “Russia’s Terror Goes Viral,” For- 1 “Pune Blast: Toll Rises to 17,” Outlook India, February Conflict and Terrorism 31:5 (2008). eign Policy, March 29, 2010. 17, 2010. 30 Kevin Daniel Leahy, “Sheikh Said Buryatski and the 32 Abu Bakr Naji, The Management of Savagery, trans- 2 Vishwas Kothari and Asseem Shaikh, “Terror For- Fresh Cult of the Suicide Bombing in the North Cauca- lated by William McCants, Combating Terrorism Center, mula: RDX, Ammonium Nitrate, Oil,” Times News Net- sus,” Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst, September 16, 2009. West Point. work, February 17, 2010. 6 APRIL 2010 . VOL 3 . ISSUE 4 project entails Pakistan-based militant recruited in India, sent to Pakistan Khwaja’s account also matches Salman groups training and deploying Indian via third-party countries, trained in Ahmed’s statements about future Muslims for attacks in the Indian military tactics, and then deployed back terrorist plots targeting India. Salman heartland. This article provides insight to India to execute attacks. Established reportedly confessed that IM cadres into the Karachi Project, and how it Pakistani militant groups—such as the were being used in the ISI-LT’s Karachi possibly played a role in the Pune LT—continue to serve as the planners Project.10 According to Salman, the blast. of these attacks, but by using Indian leaders of the project remain intent on Muslims they are able to strike deeper executing bomb attacks in New Delhi, The Karachi Project into the Indian heartland. Moreover, Mumbai and Bangalore.11 The cells are Information about the Karachi Project the use of Indian citizens also helps trained to target foreigners in these was revealed by David Coleman obfuscate the role of Pakistan-based attacks.12 Salman also said that Amir Headley, a Pakistani-American who groups in the attacks. Raza Khan, one of the IM’s founders, is in in March 2010 pled guilty in the charge of the Karachi Project, along with United States to terrorist offenses.3 Some recent arrests have helped shed senior IM operatives Riyaz Bhatkal and According to information revealed more light on the activities of the project. Iqbal Bhatkal who hold vital operational by Headley, who played a key role in The interrogations and confessions of positions. The ISI also allegedly plays the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks, Mohammed Abdul Khwaja (known as a role, and collaborates with the LT in the Karachi Project was reportedly Amjad) and Salman Ahmed (known as supporting IM operatives.13 conceived in 2003 after the closure of Chottu) revealed detailed information the Inter-Services Intelligence’s (ISI) on how Pakistan-based, anti-Indian Indian authorities believe that the Pune Forward Section 23 wing in Pakistan- terrorist cells are collaborating to attack blast was part of this project.14 The administered Kashmir.4 The Karachi India.6 The arrests revealed a lethal LT- men that Indian authorities suspect of Project has allegedly mobilized militant HuJI7 and IM nexus. The goal of these having a direct role in the Pune attack and criminal syndicates—both Pakistani cells is to attack Indian-administered have ties to both the LT and the IM, as and fugitive Indian nationals—as part Kashmir as well as the Indian heartland. well as to the Karachi Project.15 Mohsin of a new wave of proxy wars targeting Khwaja is a self-styled HuJI commander Ismail Chaudhary, for example, has Indian urban centers from Karachi. with active ties to LT, Jaysh-i- been identified as an IM operative and The purpose of the project is to deploy Muhammad and IM mastermind Riaz a recruiter of the organization’s Pune Indian Muslims to carry out attacks Bhatkal. Like Headley, Khwaja revealed cell.16 Indian authorities suspect that in India using locally available bomb that a number of Indian nationals are he is part of the Karachi Project and is material so that the attacks are not housed in Karachi and are undergoing controlling sleeper cells in Pune and traced back to Pakistan.5 As part of indoctrination and training for jihadist other cities in Maharashtra state from the project, discontented Muslims are activities in India as part of the Karachi his safe haven in Karachi.17 Project.8 Khwaja himself recruited at 3 David Coleman Headley was born Daood Sayed Gi- least 24 Muslim youth and reportedly Another suspect in the Pune attack is lani and changed his name to hide his Muslim identity.