Background Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, envisioned India to operate as an inclusive, secular democracy. Secularism was a core value in the founding of the Indian National Congress in 1885, long before independence from the British Crown. Nehru’s secularist ideology, ideally, attempted to prevent... MORE

No roads penetrate the mountains of the Galgala district of Puntland’s Bari Region. Though it lies almost directly south of the bustling port of Bosasso, Puntland’s commercial capital, the moderate climate and cave-riddled hills of the relatively inaccessible Galgala region form a natural base for... MORE

Introduction Yazid Sufaat, a former captain in the Malaysian Army, was arrested under Kuala Lumpur’s Internal Security Act (ISA) in December 2001. He was directly tied to two of the hijackers involved in the 9/11 attacks against the World Trade Center and Pentagon; is known... MORE

Since the rise of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in 2003, dozens of its militant commanders have made strong imprints on the militant landscape in both Pakistan and Afghanistan. Qari Hussain Mahsud maintains a unique status due to his capability to wreak havoc in Pakistan combined... MORE

New Developments on the Colombian Battlefield  The elimination of senior FARC leadership continues to intensify under the new Colombian presidency of Jose Manuel Santos. Aggressive tactics against the senior command structure of Colombia’s Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) rebels have not let up since... MORE

Since the end of 2009, reports coming from the republic of Dagestan in Russia’s North Caucasus region have mentioned the name of the Gubden-based rebels’ leader, Magomedali Vagabov, more often than ever before. Background  Known among the North Caucasus rebels as Amir Sayfullah of Gubden... MORE

“Jihad is in my blood. It runs through my arteries and veins. If you take jihad out of me, I will become as soulless as anybody. I inherited jihad from my father. My father led [tribal] mujahideen into Kashmir on the call of the Kashmiri... MORE

Background Police in Hamburg shut down the notorious al-Quds mosque, renamed the Taiba mosque in 2008, led by German-Syrian national and voluntary imam Mamoun Darkazanli. Darkazanli (a.k.a. Abu Ilyas al-Suri) has been a suspected al-Qaeda operative, primarily as a financier and logistician, in the European... MORE

Background Fahd al-Quso’, from the al-Daha clan of the al-Awaliq tribe, was born in Aden, the former capital of the People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen, on November 12, 1974. He is an Arab-Afghan veteran of the anti-Soviet jihad. During his stay in Afghanistan, al-Quso’ was... MORE

When Chad became independent in 1960, the government came under the control of the tribes of the fertile southern region, who formed the majority of the population. However, it was only a few years before the Muslim tribes of the arid north launched a civil... MORE