Tufail AhmadKottayam: One surprising element in the reportage about the Keralites who are suspected to have gone to join the ISIS terror group in the Mideast is the mention of the Iranian route they could have taken. The Keralite group could have been very "imaginative" in selecting the Tehran route, says an expert.
Local Kerala media has been quoting unnamed sources to say at least a few of the more than 21 missing Keralites might have traveled to Tehran en route to ISIS-occupied territory. Police are yet to confirm or deny this.
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Tufail Ahmad, the director of the South Asian Studies Project, The Middle East Media Research Institute, Washington, D.C., told Onmanorama that till now Indian jihadi sympathizers are not known to have used the Tehran route, but added the current case shows it is "quite a possibility." Ahmad, a well-known and influential presence in the global discourse on militant Islam, is currently in Kerala.
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"May be these guys were very, very imaginative, knowing Iranians would not suspect Indians traveling through that country," Ahmad said over the phone about the group from Kerala. He said the Keralite ISIS sympathizers may have exploited the goodwill that exists between the Indian and Iranian governments at this point in time.
He pointed out that although the Iranian army and its proxies are fighting the ISIS in Syria on the side of the Assad regime, it is also a known fact that for years al-Qaeda and ISIS militants have been traveling through Iran to reach terror camps and fighting fronts in Afghanistan and Iraq.
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Ahmad also pointed out that the women in the group would have helped them get through Iran without raising the suspicion of Iranian intelligence and other agencies. Two of the missing Kerala women are said to be pregnant.
Ahmad said it is not possible for Iranians to effectively police their entire border, and the militants usually travel disguised as laborers. But this Kerala group could have posed as Shia pilgrims. Thousands of Indians travel to Iran every year to visit Shia holy shrines.
The Iranians could now get more alert and start keeping a watch on the Indians coming into their country, he said.
Iranians, said Ahmad, are not necessarily against the ISIS but are concerned more about the terror group creating trouble inside their own country. Iran has held several al-Qaeda militants for years in jail and uses them as a bargaining chips in the geopolitical game the country plays in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The group of four Indian youth from Mumbai who joined the ISIS in Syria, the first such case reported more than a year ago, had gone via Turkey.
