The Abu Sayyaf in the Archipelago: discrediting Islam. abetting USA foreign policy

The Abu Sayyaf in the Archipelago: discrediting Islam. abetting USA foreign policy

[Abstract]: The Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG), a fundamentalist al-Qa’ida linked Muslim terrorist organisation, predominately domiciled in the three Philippine Provinces of the Sulu Archipelago, has been responsible for killings and kidnappings in the name of honouring the greater cause of Islam. This paper examines the rise and gradual demise of the ASG to the stage where its existence at this time, is at the best, minimal in Basilan Province, and questionable in Sulu Province. The paper argues that the ASG has abandoned its original founder’s goal of establishing an independent Islamic State in the southern Philippines, opting now for hiraba rather than Jihad . This in turn allows the Philippine Arroyo Administration to pursue its domestic counterinsurgency policies in the predominately Muslim provinces of the Sulu Archipelago, by likening the actions of criminals who discredit Islam to the more acceptable liberation insurgency actions of the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF). Furthermore the criminal actions of the ASG have given legitimacy to the USA’s military presence in the Sulu Archipelago, and legitimacy to their counterinsurgency foreign policies, which are, in part, an extension of their “Global War on Terror”. The paper finds that for peace to return to the Sulu Archipelago it is important that the USA withdraw its forces from the Sulu Archipelago. As well the Arroyo Administration must allow the Philippine National Police, not the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), to pursue these criminals who purport to have commitments to a higher cause.

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