Jihadists on way home

Concern is growing that radicalised South Africans recruited by Islamic State will return home in the wake of the terrorist group's defeats in the Middle East.

In its report titled Violent Extremism in South Africa‚ the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) said that around 60 to 100 South Africans had left the country to join religious extremist group ISIS in Iraq and Syria between 2014 and 2015.

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According to the report’s co-author and junior researcher at ISS‚ Raeesah Cachalia‚ about half of those who left had “willingly” returned by August last year after "growing disillusioned with the [terrorist] group”.

Cachalia said that the returnees were made up of many women and young children‚ but were not a major threat to state security because they were not involved as fighters.

“Many who went did not necessarily go in a combative status‚” Cachalia said.

“They were not prepared for the scale of violence that was actually being carried out.”

On their return the group was debriefed by state security and the state made a decision to not prosecute them.

But she said a new wave of more militant recruits are likely to come home.

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“The concern now is that with ISIS having suffered so many territorial and other defeats [recently]‚ many of the others may be on their way home now. But not for the same reasons as the others in the first group‚ but because they were forced to come back.”

Cachalia said the remaining recruits should not be treated the same as the first group should they come back to South Africa‚ because “they may have been involved as combatants”.

“Our recommendation to government is that these individuals may need to be dealt with in a different way. Our question now is how the government will deal with them‚” she said.

According to ISS‚ people in North East and West Africa were likely join extremist groups such as ISIS because of problems with autocracy like political oppression‚ state brutality and massive unemployment among youths. But those motives were not the same for South Africans who joined. Cachalia said: “Here it was more about contributing toward the building of the caliphate‚ the utopian Islamic state‚ where all Muslims could live together in peace and defeat the enemy‚ which are Western countries like the US and France.”

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Meanwhile international media reported that ISIS has claimed responsibility for the Manchester Arena attack on Monday.

UK media reported that 22 people were killed and 59 were injured.

Spokesman for the Department of International Relations and Cooperation Clayson Monyela‚ said they could not confirm if any South Africans had been affected.

“The South African Government condemns in the strongest terms terrorist attacks in any form and from whichever quarter and in particular against the innocent children and youth... Acts of violence and extremism have no place in society and constitute a threat to peace‚ security and development‚” he said.

- TMG Digital/TimesLIVE