With the United Nations (UN) declaring Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Maulana Masood Azhar a designated global terrorist, the outfit has changed its name to Jaish-e-Muttaqi (army of the pious) at the behest of Pakistan Army-ISI in order to hoodwink the international community into believing that Islamabad is acting against terror groups.
The tactical shift comes days after the UN designated Azhar as a global terrorist under the 1267 Sanctions List.
The UN had earlier banned the outfit. Post-UN listing, the Pakistani terrorist will face freezing of assets, a travel ban, and an arms embargo by all UN member States.
The change in nomenclature of the Pakistan-based terror groups is aimed at serving the twin purpose of projecting that the Pakistani State is acting against terror groups including the JeM and the banned terror group will be able to regroup and radicalise youths. Under the new garb, the JeM will be able to recruit more youths to its fold as the outfit’s morale has faced drubbing post-Balakot strikes and the terror tanzeem’s radicalisation and recruitment drive has also been adversely affected in the wake of the fear psychosis generated after the attack at Balakot, sources in the security agencies said.
The Bahawalpur-headquartered outfit is also anticipated to creating infrastructure at other locations in order to check any repeat attack by Indian forces, sources said.
Pakistan has in the past facilitated the change in name of another UN-banned terror group Lashkar-e-Tayyaba which rechristened itself as Jamat-ud-Dawah and subsequently to Milli Muslim League, a political party launched during last elections to project LeT chief Hafiz Sayeed as a democrat.
The Pakistan Army-ISI combine is known to cheat its allies, including the US and China. The Pakistan Army provided a facility to Al Qaeda chief Osama Bin Laden at the garrison town of Abottabad and kept him under cover for over a decade and fleeced Washington for arms and funding in the name of counter-terrorism operations. The US Navy seals however killed him in an operation on May 2, 2011.
The Pak army and ISI are employing similar tactics to extract funding from China in the name of protecting its interests in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. On the terror directed at the Indian hinterland and in Jammu Kashmir, Pakistan has remained in denial mode even as it continues to use terror as a state policy against India and the JeM itself owned responsibility for killing 40 CRPF men through a suicide bombing on February 14 this year at Pulwama.