New Delhi: The key link between terror group Islamic State and the Indian recruits, Mohammad Shafi Armar (26) is believed to be killed in a US drone strike in Syria.
According to a report in Times of India, Shafi, also known as Yousuf, had reportedly become confidant of ISIS chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and was helping spreading terror group’s network in India.
He is learnt to have recruited at least 30 men for the group. According to 23 ISIS recruits arrested by the NIA in last one year, Shafi, a native of Bhatkal in Karnataka, had planned to establish an ISIS unit in every state.
The TOI report also claimed to confirm Shafi's death from three top government and intelligence sources.
Listed on the Interpol website, Shafi had recently formed Junud al Khalifa-e-Hind by dismantling the Ansar-ul-Tauhid (AuT), an offshoot of banned terror group Indian Mujahideen.
The report also mentioned that Shafi was in touch with at least 600-700 youth through social media platforms over the past one year, and may have recruited some of them for fight for the group.
Shafi’s elder brother Sultan Armar, who was heading the outfit's India franchise till last year, was killed in March last year while fighting alongside the ISIS in Syria.
According to the National Investigation Agency (NIA), Shafi left for Pakistan along with his brother Sultan was the main brain behind the online recruitment of young men across the country to join ISIS.
The Armar brothers’ link to ISIS was first figured during the interrogation of Yasin Bhatkal, who was arrested near the Nepal border in 2013.
