Following a visit by former U.S. State Secretary Colin Powell to the Philippines in 2002, the U.S. included the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), the New People’s Army (NPA) and Prof. Jose Maria Sison, consultant to the negotiating panel of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) in peace negotiations with the Government of the Republic of the Philippines, in its list of “terrorists.” While the CPP-NPA-NDFP has not used terror tactics in its 37 year armed revolution against the Philippine government, it nevertheless is a major concern for the U.S. The CPP-NPA-NDFP, like the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia or FARC, has been included as targets in the U.S. “global war on terror” although its concern at this historical juncture is to wage a war of national liberation.

In southern Thailand, there is a separatist element in the resistance to assimilation of the ethnic Malay majority in four of the country’s southern provinces.

Only Jemaah Islamiyah, reportedly based in Indonesia, is said to have a regional agenda of establishing an Pan Islamic state in Southeast Asia.

But Islamist groups, including those participating in mainstream politics, represent a very small minority of Muslims in Southeast Asia. In the June 1999 parliamentary elections in Indonesia, the self-defined Islamist parties – the PBB (Partai Bulan Bintan) and PK (Partai Keadilan) and others that advocated for the establishment of an Islamic state received less than six percent of the votes. Within this minority, an even smaller minority advocates violence. [10]

In Malaysia, Parti Islam se-Malaysia, which also advocates for an Islamic state, won only 27 seats in the 193-seat parliament, during the November 1999 elections. It also controls only two of Malaysia’s thirteen states.

Official reports, including that of the Congressional Research Service, claims that the radicalization of Islamist movements in the region started in the early 1990s and that Al Qaeda began establishing a network in the region in the mid-1990s. It also claims that extensive links between Al Qaeda and Jemaah Islamiyah have been established. And that the Bali bombing, supposedly carried out by Jemaah Islamiyah presented evidence of this link and a shift in Al Qaeda tactics to “soft targets.”

But the International Crisis Group (ICG), a conflict resolution group headed by Gareth Evans, a former Australian foreign minister, said that there is scant evidence linking Al Qaeda with Indonesian radicals.[11] It also revealed that Abu Bakar Baasyir, alleged leader of Jemaah Islamiyah who was arrested for the Bali bombing, is the founder of the “Ngruki network”, a loose group of Indonesians advocating for the establishment of an Islamic state. Baasyir, said the ICG, lived in exile after the Darul Islam movement was suppressed in the 1980s but has returned to Indonesia after the downfall of Suharto. His activities, upon his return, was to advocate for an Islamic state and a vague idea for a revived caliphate, which is not even illegal.

The ICG report accused the Philippine government of planting explosives on an Indonesian radical, Agus Dwikarna, who was arrested in March, 2003 to give credence to reports of alleged links between Indonesian radicals and the Al Qaeda.

It concluded that Indonesia is not a hotbed of terrorism, implicitly rejecting Washington’s suggestion that Southeast Asia is the “second front” in the war.[12]

Data and information from both official and independent studies reveal that there is no real terrorist threat in Southeast Asia. Nor are there definitive links between these groups and the Al Qaeda network, purportedly the target of U.S. operations.

There does exist a movement opposed to U.S. imperialist interest, the CPP-NPA-NDFP. But it does not employ terrorist methods and is not a threat to the American people.

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