Extremism

US State Dept designates senior LeT commander and two others as ‘global terrorists’

The United States on Tuesday designated Abdul Rehman al-Dakhil, a senior commander of Lashkar-e-Taiba who carried out attacks in India, as a global terrorist. Two others, who worked as financial facilitators were also branded such.

The US State Department said Abdul Rehman al-Dakhil has been designated a global terrorist to deny him resources to plan and carry out terrorist attacks. The US State Department imposes sanctions “on foreign persons who have committed, or pose a significant risk of committing, acts of terrorism that threaten the security of US nationals or the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States,” according to the statement.

The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control designated two of the group’s financial facilitators – Hameed ul Hassan and Abdul Jabbar – as specially designated global terrorists.

“These Lashkar-e-Tayyiba financial facilitators are responsible for collecting, transporting and distributing funds to support this terrorist group and provide salaries to extremists,” said Treasury Under Secretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Sigal Mandelker in a statement. “Treasury’s designations not only aim to expose and shut down Lashkar-e-Tayyiba’s financial network, but also to curtail its ability to raise funds to carry out violent terrorist attacks.”

Earlier, The US State Department has stated its concerns about the participation of Lashkar-e-Taiba affiliated individuals in the July 25 elections to Islamabad.

In a statement a copy of which is available with Dawn, the department noted with satisfaction that the Pakistan Election Commission had rejected the registration of Milli Muslim League(MML) in June, “citing its linkages to LeT, an internationally-sanctioned terr­orist organisation”.

“We have repeatedly expressed our concerns to the Pakistani government about LeT, including the participation of LeT-affiliated individuals in the elections,” the statement said.

Abdul Rehman al-Dakhil, also known as Danish Ahmad, is closely associated with  Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, the mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. He was the operational leader of Lashkar-e-Taiba’s attacks in India between 1997 and 2001 and the group’s divisional commander for the Jammu region in 2016, ANI reported. He is still a senior commander of the group.

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