Nearly two decades after a major U. Army General Austin Miller, the top U. He concurred with recent reported intelligence assessment that IS militants could plan and stage attacks in Europe and the United States. The U. Security authorities around the globe are arresting terrorist suspects linked to IS in Afghanistan. On July 2, police in Australia arrested three men in connection to a plot to attack police and defense buildings, courts, churches, and diplomatic missions in Sydney.
One of the suspects is believed to be preparing to enter Afghanistan for the purpose of engaging in hostile activities on behalf of the Islamic State group, according to Australian Federal Police Assistant Commissioner Ian McCartney. These include an year-old Texan man, Martin Azizi-Yarand, who reportedly masterminded an attack on a local mall in and was sentenced to prison for 20 years in April.
Citing anonymous intelligence sources, the report said that Rakhmat Akilov, 39, from Uzbekistan had links with IS in Afghanistan. Akilov plowed a truck into pedestrians in Stockholm in Kugleman, however, argues that the Taliban pose a more serious threat in Afghanistan.
After its emergence in early , the IS branch in Afghanistan branded itself as the Khorasan Province. Soon afterward, the militants poured into several districts of eastern Nangarhar Province bordering Pakistan, which eventually prompted several large Afghan and U.
In April , the U. So far, the group has defied repeated claims by Afghan and U. The resilient group appears to have extended to neighboring Kunar Province, where officials see its numbers mounting to more than In May, Kunar Governor Abdul Satar Mirzakwal claimed that IS fighters had failed in an attempt to carve a territorial corridor linking Kunar to the northeastern province of Badakhshan through Nuristan by capturing territories in the three provinces.
