The ISIS militia wouldn’t have got anywhere if they were not promoted as enemies by the West, and the West was not bombing them, supporting them at the same time in Syria and in Libya, activist and journalist Sukant Chandan told RT.
RT:How much damage can the Islamic State's global PR campaign do to international security, now that its recruitment centers are opening in countries like the UK and Canada?
Sukant Chandan: The propaganda from the death squads known as ISIS is nothing but a reflection of the mainstream Western foreign policy because Western foreign policy says “Assad is a tyrant that has to be overthrown, Putin is a tyrant that has to be overthrown” and supporting color revolutions, etc. “China is a big problem, Libya before, and Muammar Qaddafi needs to be overthrown.” And actually in Libya and then Syria we have seen these exact death squads allied openly together in the destruction of Libya and even today the sympathetic voices in the mainstream who are reporting these death squads who are going from Britain, Belgium, France and other countries, but particularly Britain. And there is no coincidence because Britain has been in the forefront of developing this global containment strategy, this global counter-insurgency strategy. But actually the encouraging of children to enact these deprived acts is again a reflection of the mainstream, because if you see a lot of these young men who are no doubt oppressed by the system in Britain. Being oppressed doesn’t necessary mean you go off and do this.
RT:How should Europe and the US respond to this kind of PR campaign?
SC: I think there are two main things that people should focus on. First of all, is to ally up with the effective and functional counter-terrorism strategies which is not coming from London and Washington but actually is coming from Moscow, Beijing, Damascus, and Tripoli too but is no longer, and from places like Algeria etc. These are countries that have viable counter-terrorist strategy and terrorism is being promoted by London and Washington because who is London’s and Washington’s main ally in the so-called ‘war on terror’ – it’s no other than the two pillars that promote, facilitate and fund these death squads, which is the Gulf monarchies, particularly the Saudi Arabia and the Qatari monarchy, on the other hand the Pakistani military intelligence.
RT:The radical group has made quite a few threats to "retake some Western states," for example, Spain. Is this a real threat or just another PR move?
SC: This is pure PR nonsense and these people are promoted as enemies. You know, these people wouldn’t have got anywhere if they were not promoted as enemies by the West and the West was not bombing them and at the same time supporting them in Syria and in Libya, so there is no threat to Spain by these people. But there is a threat; it is possible that the British Intelligence services would allow one of these people to conduct terrorism in London just as they did on 7/7. The British services have all of these guys; they are heavily monitoring their phones, computers etc.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.