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November 2020 MLM VOLUME XI, ISSUE 10, NOVEMBER 2020 THE JAMESTOWN FOUNDATION Ba Ag Moussa’s Abu Muhammad al- Shaykh Abukar Mawlawi Abdul Masri and Husam Hakim— Killing: France, Ali Adan: The Abd al-Rauf—Death Taliban’s Mali and the Making of a of Top Leaders Negotiator-in- issue of New al-Shabaab Raise Questions Chief at the Negotiating with BRIEF Leader About the Future of Intra-Afghan Jihadists al-Qaeda Talks SUDHA JOHN FOULKES SUNGUTA WEST RAMACHANDRAN DARIO CRISTIANI SHAN A. ZAIN VOLUME XI, ISSUE 11 | NOVEMBER 2020 Radullan Sahiron—Is the Abu Sayyaf originally associated with the Moro National Leader Partnering with Islamic State Liberation Front (MNLF), but left the group in in the Philippines? 1992 to join Abu Sayyaf alongside other extremists who were disillusioned with that organization’s compromises with the Manila John Foulkes government. When Sahiron made the move to ASG, he had under his command a fighter On November 22, four members of the Abu named Hatib Hajan Sawadjaan. Sawadjaan is Sayyaf Group (ASG) surrendered to the Armed today the de facto leader of Islamic State’s Forces of the Philippines (AFP) in Patikul, Sulu regional affiliate, Islamic State East Asia province province. One of the four was revealed to be the (ISEA) (Sunstar, February 22, 2019). grandson of Radullan Sahiron, a leader of ASG and a multi-decade veteran of the Philippines’ Sahiron has been a part of the ASG leadership insurgencies (Manila Bulletin, November 22). for several decades, having reportedly joined the Sahiron is one of the most senior and highly organization’s 14-member leadership council, respected of ASG’s factional leaders. He is also a the majlis shura, in 1999. In mid-2002, he acted as prominent leader of the organization who has a close advisor to ASG leader Khadafi Abubakar not pledged bay’ah (allegiance) to Islamic State. Janjalani, who took over the position following However, recent activity suggests that he is the December 1998 death of his brother and growing closer to that international organization, ASG founder Abubakar Abubakar Janjalani. with worrying repercussions for the Philippines. From 2000 to 2003 he led a sub-group of the Sahiron is an ethnic Moro and is believed to organization, ASG-Putol, which consisted of have been born in either 1952 or 1955 in about a hundred fighters, before further climbing Kabbun Takas, Patikul, Sulu. He reportedly lost the ranks of the organization to become the his right arm above the elbow while fighting the overall commander of the group’s forces on Jolo AFP in the 1970s, earning the nickname Island, Sulu province. At this point, Sahiron ‘Commander Putol’ (meaning ‘cut off ’ in Filipino) reportedly commanded approximately a (FBI.gov, February 27, 2007). Sahiron was 1 VOLUME XI, ISSUE 10, NOVEMBER 2020 THE JAMESTOWN FOUNDATION thousand fighters. After Khadafi Abubakar Sawadjaan to leave his command (Sunstar, Janjalani’s death in September 2006, Sahiron February 22, 2019). Sahiron’s aversion to emerged as one of the group’s senior leaders, following Islamic State, and instead focusing on alongside Yasir Igasan and Isnilon Hapilon conducting criminal activities, led to a splintering (UNSC, April 17, 2018). within the larger ASG organization in 2014, as Islamic State-aligned ASG leaders, such as the Sahiron has been on the FBI’s most wanted list now-dead Isnilon Hapilon and Sawadjaan, since 1993, when he was involved in the pushed for more terrorist attacks. kidnapping of a U.S. citizen (FBI.gov, February 27, 2007). Sahiron was designated as a terrorist Recent events, however, seem to indicate that he by the U.S. Treasury Department in November has changed policies, or at least made a 2005. The department cited his involvement as a temporary marriage of convenience with the key leader in multiple kidnapping-for-ransom ASG faction affiliated with Sawadjaan’s IS-EA. operations. The largest such operation he Analysts have speculated that increased oversaw was the April 2000 kidnapping of 21 operations by the AFP in Patikul have pushed tourists, including Westerners, Malaysians, and Sahiron’s faction and IS-EA together. Sahiron Filipinos. By December 2003, Sahiron likely and Sawadjaan jointly commanded an ambush raised more than $636,000 from several of AFP soldiers on April 17, which involved kidnapping-for-ransom operations. approximately 40 IS-EA/ASG fighters, and killed 12 Filipino soldiers, wounding 13 The ASG leader is also responsible for (Operation Pacific Eagle-Philippines Report, coordinating a series of bombing attacks that June 30, 2020). killed 11 people and wounded 200 others in October 2002. The bombs used in the attack A day after the ambush, AFP soldiers killed reportedly were assembled in his headquarters Vikram Sahiron, Radullan’s grandson. Vikram (Treasury.gov, November 30, 2005). Sahiron was a bomb-maker who was reportedly involved in both the April 17 ambush and the Since these exploits in the early 2000s and his January 19, 2019 Jolo Cathedral bombing rise to further leadership in 2006, Sahiron has (Rappler, April 19). Sawadjaan was allegedly the continued to use Jolo Island, specifically the “mastermind and financier” of the cathedral mountainous town of Patikul, as a base of bombing, which killed 23 and wounded over 100 operations. He has taken part in multiple others (Rappler, July 24, 2019). gunfights with the AFP, who have relentlessly targeted him. In April 2015, the AFP engaged in On November 3, 2020, the Joint Task Force Sulu a two hour firefight with forces led by Sahiron intercepted an ASG speedboat that, according to (Rappler, April 9, 2015). He was reportedly the AFP, was planning to conduct kidnapping- injured engaging soldiers associated with the for-ransom activities. The seven militants AFP’s Joint Task Force Sulu in March 2016 (The onboard the speedboat were killed in the Philippine Star, March 19, 2016). encounter with the Filipino military. Two of the dead were nephews of Sawadjaan, and the Sahiron has historically not associated with AFP’s Western Mindanao Command said that foreign fighters and has not pledged loyalty to the operation they were conducting was being Islamic State (Asia Sentinel, April 24). That overseen by both Sawadjaan and Sahiron (CNN Sahiron would not allow foreign fighters in his Philippines, November 3). group—believing them to be “magnets for military airstrikes”—led current IS-EA leader 2 VOLUME XI, ISSUE 10, NOVEMBER 2020 THE JAMESTOWN FOUNDATION Sahiron has seemingly avoided closer ties to Shaykh Abukar Ali Adan: The Islamic State’s affiliates in the Philippines since the first ASG factions made their oaths to former Making of a New al-Shabaab Caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in 2014 due to an Leader aversion to hosting foreign fighters and a predilection toward focusing on criminal Sunguta West activities and minimizing risks. Sawadjaan, meanwhile, has introduced foreign fighters— Shaykh Abukar Ali Adan—a hardliner within al- something Sahiron has opposed—and suicide Shabaab, the Somali-based Islamist militant bombing tactics to the insurgency in Sulu. group—is believed to have risen to the organization’s top leadership position, after the Increasing pressure from the AFP is pushing current emir transferred power to the Sahiron closer to Sawadjaan’s IS-EA, as organization’s former military leader. indicated by their recent collaborations. ASG factions are organized within familial and clan- In August this year, reports emerged that Shaykh based cells, so the fact that family members of Ahmed Diriye a.k.a. Abu Ubaidah had both leaders have reportedly worked for the reassigned power to Adan. Abu Ubaidah other side is indicative of a growing integration relinquished the position in order to battle between the factions. Should the two formally kidney failure. The move, which promoted one combine their forces, it would change the of his deputies above other contenders, was seen dynamic of the insurgency for the worst, as further widening existing internal augmenting the number of fighters the disagreements, causing a split within the al- insurgency is able to place in the field while Qaeda affiliate in East Africa (The Standard, potentially simplifying their chain-of-command. August 31). Furthermore, it could act as a beacon to other extremists in the Philippines and the wider The exact timing of the actual transfer of power region, especially should Sahiron acquiesce to is unclear, but the change had been widely Sawadjaan’s policy of allowing foreign fighters to anticipated following earlier reports that the join the group. Differences in policies, leadership supreme leader was ailing and unable to styles, and the continued domination of familial- discharge his duties efficiently. The decision also based faction within ASG are likely to keep these came amid reports that the militant group’s top leaders and their followers from fully integrating leadership had been wrangling over who would their operations, but their cooperation will, at the take over following the demise of Abu Ubaidah. very least, hurt the AFP’s mission of stabilizing this volatile province. According to Somalia’s intelligence agency, the National Intelligence Security Agency (NISA), Adan is currently supervising and running the John Foulkes is the Editor of Militant Leadership group’s activities, including suicide and IED Monitor. bombings, illegal taxation and assassinations (Garowe online, August 28). Who is Shaykh Abukar Ali Adan? Adan (a.k.a Shaykh Abukar Ali Aden, a.k.a Shaykh Abukar, a.k.a Ibrahim Afghan) is an al- Shabaab militant leader, who served as a deputy 3 VOLUME XI, ISSUE 10, NOVEMBER 2020 THE JAMESTOWN FOUNDATION to the emir. Although information about him is Analysts say Adan changed how al-Shabaab scant, he is believed to be a hardliner who is on approached fighting. In various attacks, the good terms with the current supreme leader.
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