After nearly a decade of pursuing the radical mastermind, on May 2, 2011, U.S. commandos located bin Laden’s lair and assassinated him in Abbottabad (northern Pakistan). While Americans welcomed his death, others — some in far away Southeast Asia — secretly vowed to avenge it.
In a unique news piece, France 24 provides a lens into surprise terror networks that exist thousands of miles from bin Laden’s former residency. Journalist Cyril Payen delves deep into the bowels of these Southeast Asian terror networks, exposing radical agendas and an inherent attachment to the fallen terror leader. France 24 has more:
…we decided to continue to Pakistan for an investigation we began several years ago that took us across the whole of Southeast Asia on the trail of al Qaeda’s Asian soldiers. We also tried to understand something that is evident from the determination of hundreds of jihadists — the feelings of injustice and discrimination that are so widespread from Afghanistan to Indonesia, and in a large part of the Muslim world.
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To follow the trail we had to gain the confidence of guerrillas in the jungle of Jolo, in the southern Philippines. The same went for Islamist fighters in Aceh, in Indonesia, and for networks of repented terrorists, convicted terrorists in jail, fugitives’ families, terrorism experts and sympathisers.
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