British Muslims fighting UK forces in Afghanistan: Report

August 02, 2008

London, August 2:: British Muslims are part of the Taliban militia fighting against UK security forces in Afghanistan, a top British commander, who served in the restive country, has said.

 "There are British passport holders who live in the UK who are being found in places like Kandahar," said Brig. Ed Butler, who spent six months commanding British forces in Afghanistan.

UK security forces have found evidence that British Muslims are actively supporting the Taliban and al-Qaeda in attacks on coalition forces in southern Afghanistan, Brig Butler was quoted as saying by the Daily Telegraph newspaper on Saturday.

When British forces deployed to Helmand province in 2006, Brig Butler warned the government that there was a strong possibility that UK troops would end up killing Muslims who held British passports and were fighting with the Taliban and al-Qaeda, the report said.

According to the report, the commander said British Muslims are helping the Taliban force fighting against the country's troops deployed under the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in southern Afghanistan.

Earlier in 2008, it was revealed that RAF Nimrod spy planes monitoring Taliban radio signals in Afghanistan had heard militants speaking with Yorkshire and Midlands accents, the report said.

"While my troops have not actually found British

passports on enemy dead there has been a suspicion that with the high number of Taliban casualties they have needed to recruit a lot of foreign fighters and some of these are likely to be of British Muslim descent," one officer said in the report in the British daily.

Western intelligence agencies have expressed concerns that Afghanistan and its lawless border with Pakistan are housing camps used by Jihadi groups to train radicals from the Western countries.

Brig Butler, who took premature retirement from the British Army earlier in 2008, is currently Commander of Joint Force Operations based at Northwood, near London, and will formally leave the army next year.

He believes the continued presence of radical British Muslims in southern Afghanistan is one of the reasons British forces must remain in the region, despite the heavy number of battlefield fatalities, the report said.

Several British Muslims were detained in Afghanistan during the 2001 US-led military operation to overthrow the Taliban, and were held at Guantanamo Bay as enemy combatants.

Source: The Indian Express, New Delhi

URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-terrorism-jihad/british-muslims-fighting-uk-forces/d/409