IndiaTerrorist threats to Kashmir Journalists has Turkey Link?

Terrorist threats to Kashmir Journalists has Turkey Link?

Date:

New Delhi, Nov 17: In the backdrop of recent threats to Kashmir-based journalists, an intelligence report
noted that LeT terrorist Mukthar Baba, who now operates from Turkey, is the mastermind behind
putting out a hit list accusing scribes from the Union Territory of being informers for security forces.
According to police, a First Information Report, or FIR, under anti-terrorist law Unlawful Activities
(Prevention) Act (UAPA) has been registered and investigations have been launched after the
emergence of the “hit-list”.
An intelligence assessment based on inputs from central intelligence agencies suggest that Baba, visits
Pakistan frequently from Turkey and is the kingpin in building and propagating false narrative, grooming
youngsters in the Valley for terrorism under the banner of The Resistance Front (TRF), which is an
offshoot of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).
Baba, originally a resident of Srinagar, shifted to Nowgam before escaping to Ankara, Turkey. He has
built a network of informers from within journalists on the basis of whose inputs he has prepared the
current hit list, sources said.
According to sources, he remained affiliated with terror outfit Hizbullah in the 1990s and was shunted
out from the outfit after he was found involved in selling 40 AK series rifles belonging to Hizbullah to
another terrorist organization.
Thereafter, he remained associated with Masrat Alam-led Muslim League and is notorious for his
coercive means to compel journalists and media outlets in the Valley to toe Pakistani and terrorist line in
reporting and .
Sources stated that he has always been close to Pakistani agencies while being active in Srinagar with
several secessionist outfits. Baba has also been active on social media, making all out efforts to push the
narrative at the behest hostile foreign agencies.
Baba, 55, had worked as a journalist with four Valley-based organisations earlier and is very familiar with
the media in Kashmir, intelligence sources added.
He was lodged in Jammu's Kot Bhalwal Jail for quite some time in 1990.
As per reports, Baba was placed in Turkey sometime in 2018 by Jodha Carin Fischer, an American
of German origin who operated in Jammu and Kashmir as a deep penetration ISI agent for
almost eight years before her cover was blown and she was forcibly deported out.
Srinagar Police on November 12 said that a case has been registered against handlers, active terrorists
and overground workers of terror outfit LeT and its offshoot TRF for online publication and
dissemination of a direct threat to journalists and reporters based in Kashmir. The FIR was filed

under sections 13 of the UAPA, and sections 505, 153B, 124A and 506 of the IPC in Shergari Police
Station.
“It has been noticed that many media houses are irresponsibly discussing names of journalists regarding
the online anonymous threat. Media houses are requested not to fall for sensationalism and to behave
responsibly not endangering the safety and security of their fellow journalists,” Srinagar Police said.
According to sources, intelligence agencies pointed out that specific media persons and media outlets
were cleverly fulfilling the agenda of the adversary- propagating the fear and intimidation by selectively
highlighting the fact of resignations by certain journalists as a result of the hit list type message
circulated in the social media.
These entities are either conspicuously silent about the role of the Pakistan proxies in destroying the
press freedom in Jammu and Kashmir or at best muted.
The central agencies, sources said, have identified more than six individuals on the basis oif objective
evidence and have recommended a mission-based approach to expansively identify these elements,
collect evidence by way of mapping their properties, their telecommunication usage, and their travel
within the country and abroad to provide an effective response to the challenge. (Agencies)

Northlines
Northlines
The Northlines is an independent source on the Web for news, facts and figures relating to Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh and its neighbourhood.

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