The Hindu : National : Recruitment of the educated, a concern

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jul 04, 2007
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National

Recruitment of the educated, a concern

Praveen Swami

NEW DELHI: As investigations are on into the near-successful car-bomb attack on Glasgow airport — the first known instance of Indian nations having participated in an al-Qaeda linked act of terrorism — both the United Kingdom and Australia are increasingly concerned with the recruitment of highly-educated by the Lashkar-e-Taiba – an affiliate of al-Qaeda chief Osama bin-Laden’s International Islamic Front.

In March, 2005, for example, United Kingdom authorities charged British national Mohammad Ajmal Khan with conspiring to fund the Lashkar’s jihad in Jammu and Kashmir. Soon after, Australia prosecuted Sydney-based Pakistani medical student Izhar ul-Haque of training with the Lashkar. Another Lashkar-linked terrorist of Pakistani origin, Fahim Khalid Lodhi, conspired to bomb Australia’s electricity grid.

Similar use of the Lashkar as an al-Qaeda front emerged in France, where a court recently convicted Pakistani national Ghulam Rana, along with French citizens Hakim Mokhfi and Hassan el-Cheguer, of funnelling funds to the terror groups through a humanitarian front organisation. In the U.S. cleric Ali al-Timmi was found to have inspired several followers to train at a Lashkar camp in Pakistan.

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