JOIN USNIA files charge sheet against 25 for terror acts
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) Friday filed a charge sheet against 25 people for allegedly hatching a conspiracy both on physical as well as cyberspace for undertaking terrorist acts in Jammu and Kashmir and other parts of the country.
A spokesperson of the NIA said the case was filed against the by cadres of proscribed terrorist organisations - Laskhar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), Hizbul Mujahideen (HM), Al-Badr and their affiliates such as the Resistance Front (TRF) and the People Anti-Fascist Forces (PAFF).
“Investigation has unearthed a deep rooted conspiracy of Pakistan based proscribed terrorist organisations joining hands in form of a united group and shifting of their modus operandi by floating pseudo offshoot outfits portrayed as indigenous resistance groups, in whose name terrorist acts are being committed with an intention to claim deniability at the international level,” he said.
After the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019, the NIA investigation revealed, the shift was discernible in claims of terrorist acts done in J&K. “Many affiliate/offshoots outfits such as TRF, PAFF, United Liberation Front J&K ULF J&K, Muslim Janbaaz Force (MJF), Kashmir Janbaaz Force (KJF), Kashmir Tigers, Kashmir Fight, Mujahideen Gazwat-ul-Hind, Kashmir Gaznavi Force etc., had suddenly mushroomed, laying claims to various terrorist acts,” it said.
The investigation further established that all these pseudo-outfits are in fact offshoots/ rechristened versions of proscribed terrorist organisations based in Pakistan and have been floated under a deep-rooted conspiracy to portray terrorism in J&K as home-grown insurgency, the spokesperson said.
“A well-organized propaganda machinery operating in cyberspace through various websites, blogs, social media handles, closed channels on encrypted communication platforms etc. wherein concocted and skewed narrative is presented to impressionable and Pak based nodes have been used to radicalize youth,” he said.
The NIA investigation has revealed that all this media propaganda of different terrorist outfits was epicentered around common nodes operating from Pakistan.
A key element of aforementioned conspiracy was inducting new cadres in form of ‘Hybrid terrorists’ belonging to various walks of life, who could use their cover to remain rooted in the society and simultaneously carry out instructions of their terrorist handlers,” the investigation revealed.
“While acting as an OGW, they were also found indulging in terrorist actions such as grenade lobbing, undertaking lone attacks on vulnerable targets, arson etc. The investigation has also revealed a clear shift in the strategy of terrorist organization towards targeted killings of minorities, civilians, migrants, government officials and unguarded security personnel,” it added.
Sources told DH that after a painstaking investigation first such case at the national level on the ‘Hybrid’ module, where several of the accused are people who otherwise are the 'aam aadmi' or the common man, has been unearthed.
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