Radical Islam in the Maldives: Hotbed for al-Qa’ida and Islamic State

In his address at the Indian Ocean Conference (IOC) in Male city, the Republic of Maldives (hereafter Maldives) on 04 September 2019¹, former Maldivian President—Mohamed Nasheed highlighted concerns over the emerging threat posed by radical Islamist group in the Maldives. He called it the biggest challenge faced by nations spanning over the Indian Ocean Region (IOR).

The Maldives— a nation comprising 26 Atolls of more than 1,000 Islands, has nearly 100 percent Islamic population. Islam is not only the State religion, its citizens are required to adhere to it as per the 2008 revised provisions of the country’s Constitution. According to Article 9 (d) of the Constitution, “a non-Muslim may not become a citizen of the Maldives”, and also Article 10 (a) stating, “The religion of the State of the Maldives is Islam. Islam shall be the one of the bases of all the laws of the Maldives”.²

Despite attacks by Islamic extremist groups targeting bloggers and free-speech activists promoting the practises of moderate Islam, the previous government had been denying the existence of such extremist groups within the Island nation. However, since its inception in November 2018, the new administration led by President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih has initiated the policy oriented efforts to contain the spread of radical Islam in the Maldives. The Maldives’ government’s policies on counter-terrorism and violent extremism does acknowledge every act of terrorism and takes active steps against all of its manifestations.

During the recent visit of the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the Maldives (08-09 June 2019), President Solih thanked PM Modi for providing capacity building measures to Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF). Further, both leaders agreed to enhance bilateral cooperation on a range of issues, including terrorism, establishing Joint Working Group on Counter-Terrorism (JWGCT), Countering Violent Extremism (CVE), and De-Radicalisation.³ Aligning with the United Nations’ Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy (GCTS), Maldives takes necessary measures against terrorism and violent extremism. The country has also joined the Saudi Arabian initiative, ‘Islamic Military Alliance’ to fight terrorism.⁴

Last month, on 19 September 2019, the Maldivian government released the ‘watch-list’ of 17 terrorist organisations under the ‘Prevention of Terrorism Act’. The list includes entities like Islamic State (IS), al-Qa’ida, NTJ (National Thoweeth Jamaat), Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), and Harkat ul-Jihad-i-Islami (HuJI). Based on the recommendations made by the Parliamentary Committee on National Security, the list was approved by President Solih.⁵

Radical Islamist Threat in the Islands

Strategic planning had revealed that both transnational terrorist organisations, al-Qa’ida and Islamic State (IS), were trying to penetrate Maldives’ security establishments including police, military, immigration division, and the education ministry. An analysis of the unfortunate episode of the Easter Sunday bombings on 21 April 2019 in Sri Lanka, suggests that the Islamic State (IS) had established its ideological presence in the Indian Sub-continent. Post-Easter Sunday bombings, the Maldives Government had directed its security forces to tighten up vigilance at the sea-borders and conducted emergency response exercises. In a day long joint exercise on 05 May 2019, the Maldives police and military focused on inter-agency coordination to test the response and handling capabilities in countering terrorism and public protection.⁶ Despite counter-terrorism efforts and peace building measures undertaken by the new government, some incidents that had happened during the previous government, do continue to haunt the authorities and their residual impact will take time to vanish.

The spark of the existence of radical Islam ignited with the infamous kidnapping case of Ahmed Rilwan Abdulla in 2014 within a year of the appointment of former President Abdulla Yameen Gayoom. Ahmed Rilwan (28 years), a journalist with The Maldives Independent newspaper, used to write about corruption in the government body and the activities of Islamist elements in the Maldives. Ahmed Rilwan Abdulla was abducted and killed on 08 August 2014.⁷ The new President, Ibrahim Solih set up a Presidential inquiry commission to investigate the incident. On 01 September 2019, the committee headed by Husnu Suood, in its report concluded that Rilwan was murdered by radical Islamists associated with foreign jihadi group— al-Qa’ida, which had threatened him earlier on several occasions. Addressing a Press Conference, Husnu claimed that former President Yameen had diverted the focus of the Police investigation from Rilwan’s case.⁸

In another infamous case of 23 April 2017, a Maldivian blogger—Yameen Rasheed (29 years), a critic of the then government, had also received several threats to his life for his anti-Islamic views on his blog—The Daily Panic. ⁹ Rasheed was actively involved in the public campaign to find his missing journalist friend— Ahmed Rilwan. Rasheed was found dead in his apartment with multiple stab wounds on his body. According to the police, seven radicalised young men had concluded that Rasheed had ‘mocked the religion’ and was doing things against Islam and he needed to be killed. ¹⁰

Al-Qa’ida and the Maldives

As the first case of nexus between al-Qa’ida and the Maldives appeared via Facebook page of Jabhat al-Nusra (JN) affiliated Bilad al-Sham Media (BASM), an online group which claimed to be the media representatives of Maldivians fighters in Syria. Reportedly, BASM was a group consisting 20 Maldivian jihadists, and had featured in the stories of Maldivian fighters carrying out attack for JN.¹¹ In Syria, Jabhat al-Nusra was affiliated with al-Qa’ida’s Central Command and often described as Al-Qa’ida in Syria (AQS) or al-Qa’ida in the Levant (AQL). In October 2009, the then President Mohamed Nasheed had admitted that few hundreds of Maldivians had been recruited by the terrorist groups such as Taliban, al-Qa’ida based in Pakistan and Afghanistan.¹² According to Nasheed, Maldivians who left on the excuse to study in Madrasas in Pakistan and Afghanistan, got in the clutches of the Taliban and started actively supporting the group. A month later, in November 2009, al-Qa’ida’s media wing released a video featuring Ali Jaleel aka Musab Sayyid—a Maldivian national who had joined pro-Taliban group in Pakistan, died during a suicide attack on the Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Head-Quarters in Lahore on 27 May 2009.¹³

As pointed-out earlier, the killing of Maldivian journalist—Rilwan Ahmed was directly linked to the al-Qa’ida, before his kidnapping on 28 May 2014. The group administrator of BASM— Yameen Naeem aka Abu Dujana, another Maldivian al-Qa’ida affiliated terrorist had warned Rilwan, “There will be no cooperation between you and us. Know this very clearly. Your days are short”.¹⁴

Ties between the Maldivians and transnational terrorist groups, including al-Qa’ida reportedly began way back in 2008, and with the Islamic State (IS) in 2014 when some Maldivians responded to the call of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi—the self-declared Caliph of IS.

Islamic State and the Maldives

The Maldives, to an extent, had started turning out to be a fertile ground for the IS. In an interview to the British newspaper, The Independent on 14 September 2014, former President Mohamed Nasheed, then in exile, had emphasised that radical extremist groups in the Maldives were getting “silent” support from the then government, describing it as a matter of grave concern for the society of the Maldives.¹⁵ One could see his statement as a political-rivalry, but it was backed-up with the reports of around 200 Maldivians¹⁶ who had travelled in 2014 to IS-controlled territories in Iraq and Syria to fight alongside the IS warriors and its other affiliated groups. In July 2014, an IS-affiliated group— The Islamic State of Maldives (ISM) emerged in the country, marking the first presence of IS in the Islands nation. Likewise its parent organisation, ISM’s objective was to propagate the IS ideology in the Maldives. Through a video message, ISM had urged the Maldivian youth “to strive for the Caliphate, and to stand-up against the democratic system of governance, which has ruined the Maldives”.¹⁷

On 31 August 2015, the IS media wing released a video titled, “A Message to the Maldives Government” on its YouTube channel in which three of its terrorists threatened to kill then-Maldivian President Abdulla Yameen, and to execute attacks in the country. The trio had also demanded the withdrawal of Maldives’ anti-terror bill and release of jailed opposition leader—Sheikh Imran Abdulla. ¹⁹ This was for the first time that the IS had directly addressed the Maldivian government with a strong statements which had been considered as a terror threat to the country’s tourism industry leading to the possible impact on the economy.

The previous government had remained in consistent denial about growing threat of radical Islam in the Maldives. Contrary to this position, in 2017, the Maldivian security forces arrested two IS sympathisers for conspiring suicide bombing in the Islands nation. In September 2017, the Maldivian police arrested—Ishag Ali, and Hussein Afeef, for their alleged connection with the IS terrorists based in various locations in Iraq and Syria, and for conspiring a suicide bombing attacks in the Maldives.²⁰ Earlier, on 12 May 2017, a Maldivian youth was arrested for hoisting IS flag in the late hours of the evening at the artificial beach in Male. Earlier, on 05 September 2014, a group of 200 Maldivians including 30 women wearing black niqab, and 10 children had staged a march, carrying the IS flag and calling for the “enforcement of the Islamic Shariah in the Maldives”. Some of the banners carried by the protesters read “We want the laws of the Quran,”; “Islam will eradicate secularism”; and “Shari’a will dominate the world”.²¹

Despite reports of Maldivians joining IS group in Syria and Iraq, the Maldivian government paid little attention to the developments. However, the arrests were first since 2007 Male bombing attacks marking the alertness of security agencies to address the issue of home-grown Islamist extremism within the country. The socio-economic situations, poverty, could have been the drivers behind local radicalisation. Reportedly, Maldivians who travelled to IS-controlled territories in Iraq and Syria, either belonged to the poor fishing communities, or came from the Capital city which is a mixture of radical preaching, and organised crime in the Maldives.²²

Conclusion

Being an Island nation with flourishing tourism industry, the Maldives has been on the target map of the transnational terrorist organisations. The existence of radical Islam fuels the growth of jihadi groups, which in turn would be a serious concern for the Maldives and other South Asian countries, including India. From national security perspective, the issue of growing presence of radical Islamists in the Maldives is a matter of grave concern.

While the government of the Maldives has taken steps to face this challenge, there is still a great deal to be done. Considering the proximity of the Maldives to India, both nations have been cooperating broadly in the field of intelligence sharing, as is the norm, joint efforts to contain the religious extremism, radicalisation and terrorism, need serious attention. Focusing on neighbourhood security, India has a proven track record of advising and issuing timely terror alerts to its neighbouring countries, Sri Lanka incident being a case in point. Besides, India’s National Investigation Agency (NIA) officials have been assisting the Sri Lankan investigators post-Easter Sunday attacks. As part of its neighbourhood first policy, it will be in India’s best interests to maintain vigil about the possibility of IS-inspired threat to and from the Maldives.

Statements of the influential former Maldivian President Nasheed expressing concerns over growing threat of radical Islam in the Maldives, should be taken seriously as the IS, having lost their territories in Iraq and Syria, the Maldivian fighters may try to return home, bringing with them dangerous radical ideologies that would be harmful for the Maldivian society as well as for its neighbourhood. Much worse would be the prospect of the returnees trying to set up recruitment and operational bases/modules either in India or elsewhere in the region.

Endnotes:

1. “Al Qaeda, ISIS building deep state in Maldives; radical Islam biggest threat to Indian Ocean region: Nasheed”, Times Now News, 04 September 2019, Available from: https://www.timesnownews.com/international/article/al-qaeda-isis-building-deep-state-in-maldives-radical-islam-biggest-threat-to-indian-ocean-region-nasheed/482547
2. Republic of Maldives. Ministry of Legal Reform, Information, and Arts. “The Constitution of the Republic of Maldives 2008”, Available from: : http://www.maldivesinfo.gov.mv/home/upload/downloads/Compilation.pdf
3. Government of India. “India-Maldives Joint Statement during the State Visit of Prime Minister to Maldives”, Ministry of External Affairs, 08 June 2019. Available from: https://www.mea.gov.in/bilateral-documents.htm?dtl/31418/IndiaMaldives+Joint+Statement+during+the+State+Visit+of+Prime+Minister+to+Maldives
4. Republic of the Maldives. The President’s Office, State Policy- Terrorism and Violent Extremism, Available from: https://nctc.gov.mv/laws/State_Policy.pdf
5. Ahmed Aiham, “Maldives places 17 organisations on ‘terror watchlist’, The Edition, 19 September 2019, Available from: https://edition.mv/news/12476
6. “Maldives beefs up security after Sri Lanka bombings”, Maldives Independent, 06 May 2019, Available from: https://maldivesindependent.com/crime-2/maldives-beefs-up-security-after-sri-lanka-bombings-145091
7. “Rilwan killed by Maldives group linked to al-Qaeda, presidential commission reveals”, Maldives Independent, 01 September 2019, Available from: https://maldivesindependent.com/crime-2/rilwan-killed-by-maldives-group-linked-to-al-qaeda-presidential-commission-reveals-147705
8. Zaheena Rasheed, “Missing Maldives journalist killed by al-Qaeda affiliate”, Al-Jazeera, 02 September 2019, Available from: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/09/missing-maldives-journalist-rilwan-killed-al-qaeda-affiliate-190901121511620.html
9. Michael Safi and agencies. “Maldives blogger stabbed to death in capital”, The Guardian, 23 April 2017, Available from: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/23/maldives-blogger-yameen-rasheed-stabbed-to-death-in-capital
10. “Maldives blogger killed for ‘mocking Islam’, say police”, Maldives Independent, 10 August 2017, Available from: https://maldivesindependent.com/crime-2/maldives-blogger-killed-for-mocking-islam-say-police-131974
11. Iromi Dharmawardhane. “Maldives”, Counter Terrorist Trends and Analyses (Vol 8, No. 1), December 2015-Januar 2016, p. 65. Available from: https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/26369568.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3A5a89b4ad47d6703a2e8e3f40a5b03234
12. “Radicals in Pak recruiting our youth: Maldives”, News18 Network, 25 October 2009, Available from: https://www.news18.com/videos/india/maldives-pres-intw-327314.html
13. “US citizen arrested for funding Maldivian terrorist in Lahore bombing”, Minivan News Archives, Available from: https://minivannewsarchive.com/politics/us-citizen-arrested-for-funding-maldivian-terrorist-in-lahore-bombing-54230
14. Mohamed Junayd. “Translation: Summary of report on Rilwan’s abduction”, Maldives Independent, 08 September 2019, Available from: https://maldivesindependent.com/crime-2/translation-summary-of-report-on-rilwans-abduction-147805
15. Oliver Wright. “Islamic State: The Maldives- a recruiting paradise for jihadists”, Independent, 14 September 2014, Available from: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/islamic-state-the-maldives-a-recruiting-paradise-for-jihadists-9731574.html
16. “Foreign Fighters: An Updated Assessment of the flow of foreign fighters into Syria and Iraq”, The Soufan Group, December 2015, Available from: http://soufangroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/TSG_Fo reignFightersUpdate_FINAL3.pdf
17. The World Almanac of Islamism, “Maldives”, The American Foreign Policy Council, 04 May 2018, Available from: http://almanac.afpc.org/maldives
18. “Video threats, religious extremism and Maldives tourism”, Maldives Independent, 01 September 2015, Available from: https://maldivesindependent.com/feature-comment/video-threats-religious-extremism-and-maldives-tourism-116948
19. Editor. “Maldivian police foil terror attack in Male”, NewsIn Asia, 15 November 2017, Available from: https://newsin.asia/maldivian-police-foil-terror-attack-male
20. Animesh Roul. “The Maldives-Syria connection: Jihad in Paradise?”, Terrorism Monitor (Vol 12, no. 22), 21 November 2014, Available from: https://jamestown.org/program/the-maldives-syria-connection-jihad-in-paradise/#.VHLre_nF-3w
21. Peter Carty. “ISIS in Paradise: Maldives latest recruiting ground for Islamic State”, International Business Times, 02 September 2015, Available from: https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/isis-paradise-maldives-latest-recruiting-ground-islamic-state-1517853

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Written by Anurag Sharma, Research Associate, VIF and published originally in www.vifindia.org and being reproduced with due permission from Vivekananda International Foundation, Delhi duly acknowledging their copy rights.