Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan

IMU

12/12/2006

The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan in recent years has inspired attacks on U.S. soldiers and civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and it has plotted attacks on U.S. diplomatic facilities in Central Asia. In November 2004, for example, the IMU was blamed for an explosion in the southern Kyrgyzstan city of Osh that killed one police officer and one terrorist. In May 2003, Kyrgyzstan security forces disrupted an IMU cell that was seeking to bomb the U.S. Embassy and a nearby hotel in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. The IMU was responsible for explosions in Bishkek in December 2002 and in Osh in May 2003 that killed eight people.

The IMU targeted Uzbekistani interests before October 2001 and is believed to have been responsible for five car bombs in Tashkent in February 1999. IMU militants also took foreigners hostage in 1999 and 2000, including four U.S. citizens who were mountain climbing in August 2000 and four Japanese geologists and eight Kyrgyzstan soldiers in August 1999.

Regarding Uzbekistan, the C.I.A. says: "Current concerns include terrorism by Islamic militants, economic stagnation, and the curtailment of human rights and democratization." These things are all related. They are the result of Islam. Ninety percent of Uzbeks are Muslims. Uzbekistan's "president" is Islam Karimov. His regime is considered to be one of the most repressive and dictatorial in the world. Islam, like his religion, doesn't tolerate dissent. But that is not to say that this Marxist Muslim isn't without friends. George Walker Bush considers him an ally.

Prior to the breakup of the socialist and secular U.S.S.R, only the religion of man, humanism, was tolerated. So Muslims in Uzbekistan were unable to express themselves. But that all changed in 1999 when the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan joined forces with the Islamic Movement of Turkistan to initiate a terrorist assault on their people. It didn't take long for Islam to make bad people worse. The reign of terror began with a bomb blast in a Tashkent market, killing a dozen shoppers.

These jihadists operate throughout the Caucasus region in Afghanistan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Turkistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. Their ultimate goal is the same as it is with Muslims the world over: to use terrorism to establish an Islamic government.

The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan was formed in 1998 with the objective to create an Islamist state in Uzbekistan and then a pan-Islamic theocracy across the Caucasus Region and Central Asia. The desired Islamist state, referred to as Turkistan, would encompass Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and the Xinxiang province of China, along with Afghanistan and portions of the Georgian Republic. With this ambitious goal in mind, some members of the terrorist group refer to themselves as the Islamic Party of Turkistan.

The IMU is made up of fundamentalist Islamic militants from throughout Central Asia. They are funded by OPEC warlords. The group was co-founded by an Islamic mullah and a former Soviet soldier who served in the Soviet-Afghan war. It was the co-founder's experience in fighting against the mujahideen in Afghanistan that eventually led him to jihadist Islam and an alliance with Osama bin Laden.

The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan has grown increasingly close to al-Qaeda, as well as the Taliban and thus Pakistan. The religious group subscribes to Wahhabi or Salafi fundamentalist Islam so they share al-Qaeda's ideology and objectives. Therefore, it should not be surprising that the IMU attacked Afghanistan's Islamic Northern Alliance on behalf of al-Qaeda and the Taliban. In return, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan has received money from bin Laden, from the Pakistanis, and from the Afghani drug trade. To this day, they provide a safe have to the Taliban and other Islamic terrorists.

The IMU's interest in a pan-Islamic state has broadened its mission form terrorizing strictly Uzbek targets to attacking coalition forces in Afghanistan and Iraq and U.S. diplomatic facilities throughout Central Asia.

Jumaboi Khojaev, co-founder of Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, was a paratrooper in the Soviet army. As a trained godless killer, Khojaev gained respect for the Islamic mujahideen in Afghanistan while fighting against them in the Soviet-Afghan war. It is said that Jumaboi Khojaev became a close associate of Osama bin Laden. There are reports that Khojaev was killed in Afghanistan while fighting coalition forces but this is unconfirmed.