(10 February 1964 – 3 June 2011)
Military career and militant activities
Kashmiri hailed from the Mirpur District[3] of Azad Kashmir in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. According to several sources, he became a member of the elite Pakistani Special Service Group,[6][10][11] although in an interview he denied this.[3] Kashmiri also spent a year studying communications at the Allama Iqbal Open University.[3]He was an active participant in the 1980s Soviet-Afghan War, training the Afghan mujahideen in mine warfare in Miranshah on behalf of Pakistan.[6] During the fighting he lost an eye and an index finger.[6][12] He continued his militant activities in Kashmir after the war as a member of Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HuJI), though disagreements with leader Qari Saifullah Akhtar several years after initially joining in 1991 led Kashmiri to establish his own new unit within HuJI known as the 313 Brigade.[6][13]
During the mid-1990s, Kashmiri and Nasrullah Mansoor Langrial were near Poonch when they were seized by the Indian Army and sent to prison, where he would spend the next two years before escaping and returning to Pakistan.[6] Upon his return Kashmiri continued to conduct operations against India, once reportedly being rewarded personally with Rs. 1,00,000 (US$1,164.24) by then Army Chief General Pervez Musharraf for presenting the decapitated head of an Indian army soldier to him.[6][14] Pictures of Kashmiri with the head of the soldier in his hands were published in some Pakistani newspapers.[14]
Post-Kashmir activities
Kashmiri rejected orders to serve under Maulana Masood Azhar in the newly founded mujahideen organization Jaish-e-Mohammed and was once even targeted by the group.[6] Falling out of favor with the Pakistani military, he was even taken into custody and tortured in late 2003 in the wake of an attempt to assassinate President Musharraf.[6] From his release in February 2004[2] until the 2007 Siege of Lal Masjid he apparently did little, but later returned to the 313 Brigade in the terrorist organization Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami (HUJI), which is closely tied to Al-Qaeda. Kashmiri rebuilt its strength while collaborating with the Taliban. This was part of a broader movement of Kashmir militants moving to Waziristan,[15] and Kashmiri reportedly moved personnel from his Kotli (Kashmir) training camp to a new one in Razmak (North Waziristan).[16] A U.S. indictment of Kashmiri states that he "was in regular contact with al Qaeda [their italics] and in particular with Mustafa Abu al Yazid..."[17]He has been associated with a number of attacks, including the killing of Ameer Faisal Alavi.[6] According to Asia Times Online, Kashmiri was behind a 2008 plan to assassinate Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani as he stepped out of his car during daily visits to a gym; however, the al-Qaeda leadership rejected the plan on strategic grounds.[18] According to The News International, Kashmiri is accused of organizing the December 2009 Camp Chapman attack against the CIA and the United States was seeking his arrest and extradition.[19]
In early 2010, Kashmiri was reported to be the new leader of al-Qaeda's Lashkar al Zil, or Shadow Army, following the apparent death of its former leader Abdullah Said al Libi by an American drone.[20] Kashmiri was also said to have replaced al-Qaeda military chief for Afghanistan and Pakistan Mustafa Abu al-Yazid after al-Yazid was killed in a drone strike on 21 May 2010. According to journalist Amir Mir, citing Pakistani security sources, Kashmiri was subsequently assigned the role of organizing attacks against Western targets after the regional command was taken by Saif Al-Adel, a former Egyptian army colonel newly released from Iran.[21]
In the wake of the killing of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden on 2 May 2011 during an American operation in Abbottabad, Pakistan, terrorism analysts put forth Kashmiri's name as one of several possible successors to lead the organization.[22][23][24]
U.S. indictment
On 27 October 2009, a press release from the U.S. Department of Justice named Kashmiri as a conspirator to whom an American citizen from Chicago, David Headley, arrested on terrorism related charges, "allegedly reported and attempted to report". The statement also noted that Kashimiri "issued a statement this month that he was alive and working with al Qaeda".[25] A report on details of the investigation stated that Kashmiri "was in regular contact with Headley for some time and their communications suggested that they were in the process of plotting fresh attacks in India."[26] Headley was reportedly distraught at news of Kashmiri's death, but after receiving confirmation that he was still alive, set off for Pakistan, at which time he was arrested by the FBI.[27]Kashmiri was officially indicted on two counts, for "conspiracy to murder and maim in Denmark" (against the newspaper Jyllands-Posten) and "conspiracy to provide material support to terrorism in Denmark".[17]
During court testimony on 31 May 2011, Headley indicated that he had conducted preliminary research for Kashmiri in a plot targeting Robert J. Stevens, the CEO of Lockheed-Martin, the defense contractor.[28]
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