In December 2017, Iraq’s then Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi announced the defeat of the so-called Islamic State. He took to social media and explained:
“Our (Iraq) heroic armed forces have now secured the entire length of the Iraq–Syria border. We defeated Daesh through our unity and sacrifice for the nation. Long live Iraq and its people.”
A few months earlier, in July of 2017, Abadi had visited and walked around the city of Mosul where, in 2014, ISIS chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi had announced the formalisation of the so-called Islamic State caliphate. Since then, the narratives of a ‘defeat’ have been vehemently challenged by scholars and policy planners alike, highlighting the fact that ISIS started off as an insurgency, and after its loss of territory, may find resonance amidst populations and spaces still affected by the ongoing Syrian civil war. As per conservative estimates, data reported from the US Department of Defense suggests that 31,000 ISIS fighters are still at large in the Iraq–Syria combination.
Since then, the narratives of a ‘defeat’ have been vehemently challenged by scholars and policy planners alike, highlighting the fact that ISIS started off as an insurgency, and after its loss of territory, may find resonance amidst populations and spaces still affected by the ongoing Syrian civil war.
The ground situation in Iraq and Syria, while still ripe for an ISIS return, has also created ripples in traditional security structures of countries such as India. This month, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval visited Iran to meet his counterparts from Afghanistan, China, the hosts Iran and Russia. On the agenda was the fight against the ISIS. The conference of these leaders responsible for the security architectures of their respective nations to concentrate on a ‘defeated’ entity highlights the disparity in both perceiving the future threat the ISIS poses and a generally fractured consensus on what, how, when and where an inevitable resurgence of the terror group is bound to take place. On the other spectrum, India has also significantly deepened its security ties with Arab nations as well, with a slew of deportations from the UAE and some from Saudi Arabia over the past two years, highlighting the changing dynamics of India’s role in the global security scenario and the Gulf nations’ largely pro-Pakistan and apathetic views of Indian security concerns over the past many years.
Russia, China, Afghanistan and Iran meeting India on this topic, however, reflect a whole different fight against the ISIS, one that is not taking place in Syria and Iraq, but in Kabul. The rise of ISIS Khorasan Province (ISKP) in Afghanistan’s vast jihadist industrial complex, which today is experiencing a rapid rate of decline, has started to ring alarm bells in countries heavily invested in the future of the country. The so-called Islamic State’s media outlets claimed responsibility for the recent terror attack in Ahvaz, a city in southwestern Iran that killed 30 people, including the attackers on 22 September. Initially, Iran had blamed ‘foreign forces’ and ‘Arab separatist groups’ backed by the US, Saudi Arabia, UAE and Israel. However, Tehran revised its claims after the ISIS took responsibility, and launched retaliatory cruise missiles on the ISIS targets in Syria. Over the past few years, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) has shopped for fighters in Afghanistan to fight parts of its war in Syria, having a negative impact on the country’s image within Afghan provinces such as Herat, Nimroz and Farah.
ISIS release of claiming attack on military parade in Ahvaz, Iran on 22 September. Note the image is not of the attackers but one that is stock, and sourced from the internet.
The advent of the ISKP in the Afghan jihadist landscape, and its ability to conduct attacks in highly fortified places in the capital city of Kabul has showcased the group’s abilities, specifically at a time when the general health of the country’s security outlook is deteriorating at a rapid pace. The ISKP has come up as a disruptive entity to the Taliban’s narratives as well, while the lines between both the Taliban’s and the ISKP’s ecosystems remain highly blurred, according to multiple research efforts on the latter’s rise. While the US and Afghan armed forces have been regularly targeting ISKP strongholds in the country’s northern provinces, specifically the region surrounding Nangarhar. There were multiple reports of high-level ISKP commanders being killed, but still the attacks have not slowed down.
The advent of the ISKP in the Afghan jihadist landscape, and its ability to conduct attacks in highly fortified places in the capital city of Kabul has showcased the group’s abilities, specifically at a time when the general health of the country’s security outlook is deteriorating at a rapid pace.
The threat that the ISKP poses has more implications to the security of South Asia than the original ISIS. Over the past few weeks, the ISIS has claimed a variety of attacks in Pakistan, including a strike on a hospital in Quetta that killed 150 people. On 28 September, the ISIS aligned
Amaq News released a statement claiming that the ISKP targeted Pakistan Army personnel in the restive province of Balochistan’s Mastung district, killing 16 and wounding 30.
Amaq claim of ISIS attack on Pakistani personnel in Balochistan released on 28 September.
For India, while the influence of the ISIS in domestic sphere has been almost nonexistent, islands of concern, specifically relating to the presence of former Indian Mujahideen (IM) members in both Syria and Afghanistan, added a sense of urgency to create broader arrangements with partners in West Asia and the extended region to both keep a check on Indians or those of Indian background that may have joined and operated for the Islamic State and side by side flag the ISKP as a serious potential destabiliser to Afghanistan’s already fragile political environment.
The IM cabal that has been associated with the ISIS, while small in number, invokes an interesting dynamic. Former IM cadre member such as Shafi Armar, also known as Yusuf al-Hindi, founder and self-declared emir of Junud Al Khalifa-e-Hind, have featured prominently in their roles as online propagators of the caliphate. Others include the likes of Muhammad “Bada” Sajid, the IM commander killed in Syria in 2015, Abu Rashid, who has been absconding since 2015 and thought to have died fighting for the ISIS in Syria, as well as some others whose information on their roles in the ISIS remains uncorroborated, showcase how a disbanded IM still had significant and active influence groups existing, if not operating.
India’s outreach in attempts to secure itself from any extended influence of the Islamic State requires equal partnerships with states such as Saudi Arabia and the UAE along with Iran as well, specifically in Afghanistan. Doval’s visits to the region showcase India’s increasing importance in the global security environment, with calls for both an uptake in narrative and presence from New Delhi in multilateral, bilateral and unilateral negotiations in conflict resolution, particularly in West Asia. It is both timely for New Delhi to stand strong with states directly warring with the ISIS, and get first hand experience in the many ways in which the ISIS has disrupted, re-organised and re-established the threat of international terrorism. With a growing economy and global expectations off it, India must get used to playing larger roles in conflict management both via diplomatic and military mechanisms.
The views expressed above belong to the author(s). ORF research and analyses now available on Telegram! Click here to access our curated content — blogs, longforms and interviews.
PREV
