Philippines: Militant Islamic Converts and Terrorism
Jakarta/Brussels |
19 Dec 2005
A small minority of militant Muslim converts in the Philippines is complicating efforts to fight terrorism and make peace in Mindanao, but government practices too often play into militant hands by subordinating procedural justice to careless counter-terror measures.
Philippines Terrorism: The Role of Militant Islamic Converts,* the latest report by the International Crisis Group, examines the significance of the Rajah Solaiman Movement (RSM), a terrorist group with ties to Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) and foreign, mostly Indonesian jihadists.
The RSM emerged in 2002 from a loose association of converts who call themselves Balik-Islam, literally, return to Islam. Concentrated in Manila and northern Luzon, many of them converted to Islam while employed as overseas workers in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries.
“The RSM, even after the arrest of its leader in October, remains a vehicle for terrorist groups based in Mindanao to reach the Philippines’ urban heartland”, says Kit Collier, Crisis Group consultant.
The report assesses RSM’s relations with ASG, hardline members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) and Jemaah Islamiyah (JI). Several counter-terrorism “successes” have inadvertently deepened the nexus between these groups. One is pressure on the MILF to stop harbouring foreign terrorists, which has pushed the latter to find new partners. U.S.-Philippine military operations on Basilan island have forced the core of ASG to flee to the Mindanao mainland, bringing it into more direct contact with militant MILF commanders. And the collapse of JI’s administrative structure in Mindanao has forced Indonesian and Malaysian members into more direct cooperation with their hosts.
The militant converts also benefit from a wider network of support, including from experienced left-wing activists who have moved to the Balik-Islam cause since the splintering of the Communist Party of the Philippines in the early 1990s. Although they do not share the RSM’s agenda, they see opportunities for organising based around perceived injustices of Manila’s urban counter-terror campaign.
“Counter-terrorism and respect for human rights are complementary, because they share the objective of protecting the innocent by prosecuting the guilty”, says Sidney Jones, Director of Crisis Group’s South East Asia Project. “It’s critically important for the Philippines government to get the balance between human rights and security right”.