Freelance operators pose a major terror threat: US
By Our Correspondent
WASHINGTON, April 28: Freelance operators are increasingly becoming a major threat, although Al Qaeda continues to be the driving force behind terrorism, the US State Department said in a report released on Thursday. Even these freelance groups draw inspiration from Al Qaeda or have had affiliations with the network, said the “Country Reports on Terrorism”.
That’s why Al Qaeda remained “the primary terrorist threat to the United States last year, intent on attacking the US homeland as well as US interests abroad,” the report said.
The annual State Department report warned that the battle against international terrorism remains formidable despite security measures in the United States, military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, and deepening international counter-terrorism cooperation.
“Over the long run, the spread of democracy and economic and social reforms, sustained and encouraged by the United States and others, should promote political, economic and social conditions inhospitable to terrorist exploitation. For now, however, the tasks confronting the United States and its partners in the struggle against terrorism remain formidable.”
Jointly with the State Department report, the new National Counterterrorism Center issued a compilation of international terror incidents last year with numbers of incidents and victims.
It said 651 significant international terrorist attacks caused 9,321 casualties worldwide, including 1,907 deaths.
Looking back on the events of 2004, the report said that while there were no attacks within the United States, many other nations were struck by terrorists.
Significantly, the United States and its allies have degraded Al Qaeda and its affiliates’ leadership and depleted its operatives, the report said. But Al Qaeda has adapted to these circumstances by spreading its ideology to local groups throughout the world.
“The diffusion of the Al Qaeda ideology in many countries makes even more crucial the need for deeper international cooperation to defeat emerging violent extremist groups,” the report said.
The State Department’s analysis of state sponsors of terrorism finds that Libya and Sudan took significant steps to cooperate in the battle against terrorism last year. Iraq was removed from the state sponsors list in October 2004.
“Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Syria, however, continued to maintain their ties to terrorism,” the report said.
While some of these countries in the latter group have improved cooperation with international counterterrorism efforts in certain areas, they have also continued actions that led them to be designated as state sponsors, the report said.
