A group of detained young Americans grilled by the FBI in Pakistan had tried to join Islamist militant groups and travel to the northwest Taliban heartland, officials said yesterday.
US President Barack Obama promised an investigation into how and why the five men left the US for Pakistan, possibly swept up in extremist movements in a country battling to contain militant organizations.
The five young men arrested on Wednesday in Sargodha, about 180km south of the Pakistani capital Islamabad, were US citizens with origins in other countries, including two Pakistani-Americans, officials said.
Police officials said the five men were planning to strike “sensitive installations” in Pakistan, but a picture formed yesterday of young Muslim men radicalized by jihadist Web sites without concrete ties to a specific group.
“They tried to contact jihadi groups in Pakistan through YouTube and other Web sites,” Sargodha district police chief Usman Anwar told a local TV station.
“From the documents and maps that they were carrying, it appeared that their destination was Miranshah, the main town of North Waziristan tribal district. This indicates what they were up to,” he said.
North Waziristan is one of seven tribal districts along the Afghan border, where al-Qaeda, Taliban and other militant groups have carved out sanctuaries and training camps in the hostile region outside direct government control.
In an interview with CNN broadcast on Thursday, Anwar said: “They were there for jihad ... They could have done anything. They had US passports. They would have access to many, many places.”
The arrests have raised fears that Muslim radicalization is gaining momentum in the US, creating high-value recruits for Islamist groups.
US Assistant Secretary of State Philip Crowley said a US embassy team, including at least one agent from the FBI and an officer from the State Department’s regional security office, met the five detainees in Sargodha.
Asked if the US government had talked to Islamabad about extraditing or bringing the five back to the US, Crowley replied: “Not to my knowledge. Not yet.”
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