Série Spéciale (7/7): Insurrection Moro aux Philippines

Ce dernier billet termine la série sur le Front Moro aux Philippines. Il est consacré au soutien externe, un point particulièrement important pour les leaders du MILF. Aperçu des liens avec la Jemaah Islamiya (JI) en Indonésie, et la question du lien avec al-Qaïda.
Je souligne ici que Romain Lalanne s'attarde également sur l'insurrection philippine dans son blog.

Précédemment: 1- Background, 2- La nature de l'insurrection, 3- La stratégie, 4- L'environnement, 5- Le soutien populaire, 6- L'organisation
Aujourd'hui: Le soutien externe

The MILF has always devoted major efforts to secure external support from the outside Muslim world. Salamat Hashim travelled a lot at the early times of the existence of the MILF and developed both overt and covert support networks in Egypt, Pakistan and elsewhere in the Muslim world . Many members of MILF received training in Libya, Malaysia, Syria, Palestine and Pakistan in the 1970-80s.

The most interesting and substantial support comes from the Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), and the potential connection with al-Qaeda. In the 1980s, many Moro Jihadis were trained by Indonesian commanders and fought alongside in Afghanistan. They created lasting ties. In the 90s, MILF offered Indonesians to take advantage of their camps’ structure and asked them some help in building military academies. Indonesians became instructors for young Indonesian Jihadis and for young Moro separatists.

The JI-MILF connection precedes JI’s emergence as a terror organization, but continued after the Bali bombings in 2000. It is hard to tell what the relationships between MILF and al-Qaeda are. Although MILF commanders publicly condemn Jihad and terror attacks since 2003, some experts suggest that they have mounted deadly attacks in collaboration with JI since 2000, and continue enjoying MILF camps facilities, although those have diminished in quality .

The connexion with al-Qaeda is very uncertain. However, it seems that Muhamad Jamal-Khalifa, brother-in-law of Osama Bin Laden had some relationships with MILF in the early 1990s .