Reuters AlertNet Lite - FACTBOX-Who are the Islamic Jihad Group?

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FACTBOX-Who are the Islamic Jihad Group?

05 Sep 2007 13:47:09 GMT
Source: Reuters

Sept 5 (Reuters) - Germany said on Wednesday it had foiled a plan by Islamist militants to carry out "massive bomb attacks" against U.S. installations and arrested the three men behind it.

Officials said the men belonged to a domestic cell of a Sunni Muslin group called the "Islamic Jihad Union" which originated in Uzbekistan.

Here are some details:

* The Islamic Jihad Group (IJG) also known as the Islamic Jihad Union, has been responsible for several high-profile bombings in Uzbekistan.

* The group is a splinter organization from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), another organisation operating in Central Asia.

* The IJG claimed responsibility for three days of attacks in Uzbekistan in March 2004 which killed at least 47 people. The group claimed responsibility for the bombings in April and said it would press on with its "jihad". It has opposed the secular regime in Uzbekistan and wanted to establish an Islamic state.

* In July 2004, the group carried out coordinated bombing attacks in Tashkent against the U.S. and Israeli embassies and the office of the Uzbek prosecutor general.

-- The attacks in the Uzbek capital, which killed two Uzbek security guards at the Israeli embassy, were the first on foreign targets in Uzbekistan.

-- In a statement they said "(These attacks) were an answer to the injustice of the apostate government and an expression of support for the jihad (holy war) of our Muslim brothers in Iraq, Palestine, Afghanistan, Hijaz (Saudi Arabia) and other Muslim lands".

* In May 2005, the U.S. State Department designated Islamic Jihad Group as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist Group. The United Nations shortly followed suit.

* Last November it was reported that Pakistan had arrested three suspects after rockets were found opposite the presidency, parliament and the headquarters of military spy agency, Inter Services Intelligence in Islamabad.

* It was also reported that the men took their orders from an Uzbek commander of the IJG named as Yakhyo, also known as Nadzhmiddin Kamilidinovich Janov.

* Uzbek militant groups relocated to Afghanistan and Pakistan's tribal lands in the 1990s to escape a crackdown in their homeland.

Sources: Reuters/www.globaldefensegroup.com

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Last updated:Wed Sep 5 13:48:12 2007