In an alarming revelation, it has been found that Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF), the charitable arm of the Lashkar-e-Taiba terror group, has been raising funds through bank accounts under fictitious names.
According to a report in The Indian Express, the bank accounts under pseudonyms continue to be active even though the FIF is blacklisted by the United Nations Security Council, obliging all member states to freeze their assets.
The Facebook page of the FIF shows that its financial sponsors of the Karachi unit, who sought information on its charity work in Syria, were asked in individual chats to send cash to an entity called the Balochistan Water Project, which has an account in Dubai bank in the city.
The FIF’s bank accounts were ordered shut in 2015 and are being investigated by the intelligence agencies of several countries. But the report claims that the account’s operations dodged the eyes of international anti-money laundering and countering-terror financing agencies.
On the other hand, the bank did not respond when questioned if it was aware that the account was held by the FIF, and whether it had counter-terrorism financing procedures in place to prevent such misuse.
Pakistan, last week, had announced that it was detaining, and not prosecuting, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, who heads the FIF as well as the Lashkar-e-Taiba’s parent political group Jamaat-ud-Dawa. It also announced that the Jamaat-ud-Dawa and FIF had been placed on a watchlist.
According to the report, it is hard for the intelligence agencies to ascertain the real scale of FIF activity as the organisation doesn’t publish audited accounts, and is publications are unclear on precise expenditures.
However, its publications clearly explain the agenda of charitable causes from Gaza and Syria to Myanmar as well as projects spanning the length of Pakistan.
The January 20 issue of the Lashkar-linked magazine Jarrar (Courage) says the FIF distributed “laakhon rupay milkiyat” (several hundred thousand rupees), buying 192 tonnes of rock and wood to pave muddy pathways in refugee camps in Syria.
In the issue, financial backers of the organisation are asked to contribute to the Syrian project in US currency -- $35 for a blanket and jacket, or $50 for this basic set with a muffler, gloves and footwear. There is no mention of exactly where the relief will be distributed.
The report further claims that FIF also organises several events where the Jamaat-ud-Dawa recruits talent from outside the peasant base from where it has been selecting low-skill cadres so far.
Days after detention of Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed and a clampdown on its activities, the terror group has once again appeared with a new name: 'Tehreek Azadi Jammu and Kashmir'.
The Mumbai attack mastermind had indicated about a week before his arrest that he might launch Tehreek Azadi Jammu and Kashmir (TAJK) to "expedite the freedom of Kashmir".
It shows that Saeed had got a wind of the official plans and already had worked out how to resurface and survive after the clampdown on his ostensible network of Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) and Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF).
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