DUSHANBE, June 1, 2015, Asia-Plus – The Prosecutor-General’s Office has reportedly launched an investigation into former OMON (special police unit) commander Gulmurod Halimov who has joined Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group in Syria.
Russia’s news agency TASS reports that Tajik competent bodies have exact information that former OMON special forces commander has joined ISIL militants in Syria.
TASS quoted an official source at the State Committee for National Security of Tajikistan (SCNS) as saying that the charge of mercenary activities has been officially brought against Gulmurod Halimov.
According to TASS, the Prosecutor-General’s Office of Tajikistan has instituted criminal proceedings against 417 Tajik nationals charged with being mercenaries.
We will recall that the Supreme Court of Tajikistan formally labeled Islamic Sate of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) as a terrorist organization in early May this year. Tajikistan”s Supreme Court has banned ISIL as a terrorist group on the basis of a suit filed by the Prosecutor-General”s Office.
Meanwhile, CNN reported on May 30 that Gulmurod Halimov was trained in counterterrorism tactics on American soil, in a program run by the United States.
Halimov who calls for jihad in online video posted on YouTube on May 27 says that he participated in programs on U.S. soil three times, at least one of which was in Louisiana.
The State Department has confirmed this claim.
CNN quoted spokeswoman Pooja Jhunjhunwala as saying, “From 2003-2014 Colonel Halimov participated in five counterterrorism training courses in the United States and in Tajikistan, through the Department of State”s Diplomatic Security/Anti-Terrorism Assistance program.”
The program is intended to train candidates from participating countries in the latest counterterrorism tactics, so they can fight the very kind of militants that Halimov has now joined.
A State Department official was quoted as saying that Halimov was trained in crisis response, tactical management of special events, tactical leadership training and related issues.
The American program in which Khalimov participated is reportedly designed to teach tactics used by police and military units against terrorists by countries that cooperate with the United States on security matters. But now experts are concerned that this defector has brought ISIL not only a propaganda victory, but also an insider”s knowledge of the playbook the United States is using in the fight against ISIL, according to CNN.
“That is a dangerous capability. It”s never a good thing to have senior counterterrorism people become terrorists,” former Army intelligence officer Michael Breen was quoted as saying.
“It sounds like he was involved in defending sensitive people and sensitive targets,” said Breen, who is now with the Truman Project in Washington. “He knows how to plan counterterrorism operations. So he knows how the people who protect a high-value target will be thinking; he knows how people who protect an embassy would be thinking.”
Former Army sniper Paul Scharre, now with the Center for a New American Security, was quoted as saying that Halimov could not only help train other ISIS fighters in tactics, but also serve as a recruiter for the group.
A State Department official said Halimov and other members of his unit were recommended for the program by the Tajik government.
The special police unit commander Gulmurod Halimov who has been missing for weeks reappeared on the Internet, claiming that he has joined Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants in protest at official restrictions on religious observance back home.
In a video posted on YouTube on May 27, Colonel Gulmurod Halimov says that Tajik labor migrants “must stop serving infidels” in Russia and join ISIL in Syria and Iraq in order to establish Shari”a law in other countries, including Tajikistan.
Halimov reportedly joined Tajik police force in the early 1990s and attended training courses in Moscow and Baton Rouge, Louisiana, in the last several years. He was appointed as commander of the special police unit on 20102.
