Patterns of Global Terrorism 1996 - Afghanistan

Plagued by the absence of a cohesive central government and ongoing fighting among rival factions, Afghanistan remained a training ground for Islamic militants and terrorists in 1996. Ahmed Shah Masood, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, and Abdul Rasul Sayyaf all maintained training and indoctrination facilities in Afghanistan, mainly for non-Afghans. They continue to provide logistic support and training facilities to Islamic extremists despite military losses in the past year. Individuals who trained in these camps were involved in insurgencies in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Chechnya, Tajikistan, Kashmir, the Philippines, and the Middle East in 1996.

The Taliban militia, which took over the capital city, Kabul, in September, has permitted Islamic extremists to continue to train in territories under its control even though they claimed to have closed the camps. The group confiscated camps belonging to rival factions and turned them over to groups such as the Pakistan-based Kashmiri terrorist group Harakat ul-Ansar.

Saudi-born extremist Usama Bin Ladin relocated to Afghanistan from Sudan in mid-1996 in an area controlled by the Taliban and remained there through the end of the year, establishing a new base of operations. In August, and again in November, Bin Ladin announced his intention to stage terrorist and guerrilla attacks against US personnel in Saudi Arabia in order to force the United States to leave the region.