‘Terror training in Pakistan goes underground’

Instead of large and visible ‘‘camps’’, would-be terrorists are being recruited, radicalised and trained in a vast system of smaller, under-the-radar Jihadist sites. And the effort is no longer overseen by senior Al Qaeda operatives as it was in Afghanistan, but by at least three of Pakistan’s largest militant groups, which are fueled by a shared radical fundamentalist Islamic ideology.

The groups themselves—Harkat-ul-Mujahedin, or HuM; Jaish-e-Mohammed; and Lashkar-e-Taiba—have officially been banned in Pakistan since 2002 and have been formally designated as terrorist organisations by the US Government. That has prompted occasional crackdowns by Islamabad, but the groups merely change their names and occasionally their leadership and resume operations, authorities say.

US officials also accuse them of complicity in many of the terrorist attacks against US and allied interests in Pakistan and other assaults in the bitterly disputed Kashmir region. Many US officials say it’s not surprising that Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf hasn’t cracked down harder on the militant groups and what they describe as their increasingly extensive training activities. For years, the ISI itself has worked closely with the groups in training Pakistan’s own network of militants to fight ongoing conflicts in Kashmir and elsewhere, and to protect the country’s interests in neighboring Afghanistan.

The militant groups also derive tremendous influence from their affiliations with powerful fundamentalist political parties in Pakistan. Until recently, the US did not press the issue with its ally, believing that those trained in the Pakistani camps would be sent only to fight in Kashmir and other regional conflicts. But that’s not the case anymore, according to US and South Asian intelligence agencies. US military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan have caused many Pak-based terrorists to redirect their rage toward US targets.

‘‘There is tremendous overlap, and that is the problem, between bin Laden and Al Qaeda, the Pakistani authorities and the Kashmiri groups,” said Bruce Hoffman, chairman of Rand Corp. and a counter-terrorism consultant to the US Government.

“Pakistan military and intelligence are well-aligned with the radical fundamentalists,’’ said a senior US counter-terrorism official. ‘‘Musharraf, he’s in (a) pickle… he’s trying to play it at both ends.’’ —LAT-WP