A hotline telephone number has been set up to allow people to share information they may have on T&T nationals who may be heading to join international terrorist group ISIS.
The information, which can be given with anonymity, will be gathered and passed on to the relevant authorities, including officials of the Ministry of National Security.
The hotline has been set up by Muslim activist Inshan Ishmael, even as word is coming that three more Trini nationals are preparing to head to Syria to join ISIS fighters.
Speaking with the T&T Guardian yesterday, Ishmael confirmed the increasing number of people leaving to join ISIS and urged those who may have information to call the hotline: 645-6397.
“If anyone knows anything and any such person, please call. Many people are selling out all their assets and even taking their children out of school so that they can leave to join ISIS but what they don’t realise is that they are walking into an inferno,” Ishmael said.
The T&T Guardian has received vital information that three men in their late 20s from the Maloney area will be leaving on Friday for the United States and from there will fly through Europe and on to Syria, where they will be met with ISIS recruiting officials.
A relative of one of the men, who wished not to be identified, told the T&T Guardian that family members were now concerned and afraid for their relative’s life when he leaves T&T and from the ramifications of his actions of their own as well.
Yesterday, Ishmael said after learning that 89-plus T&T citizens had already left the country to join ISIS, he, along with a local imam, had launched a series on ISIS educating the Muslim community, especially the new converts, on the reality of the terrorist group and what it gave.
“A lot of people are not properly educated and some of them are going to various mosques which do not offer the true teachings of Islam and whose leaders are not well educated and are being carried away.
“The true teaching of Islam is all about peace and not violence. We do not believe in hurting a plant, much less killing an innocent person and this is what ISIS is teaching people, to be violent, to kill and really and truly ISIS is fighting us, the Muslims,” he said.
He added: “They are being taught that this is the entrance to Paradise which is false. It is a blatant lie.”
He warned Muslims, especially the new converts, to be wary of recruiters.
“They are like sales reps just waiting to recruit the ‘newbies’ who are seeking what their former way of belief did not offer them. People ought to be very careful. These people play on the emotions of new Muslims,” he said.
The T&T Guardian was told that prospects are being offered as much as US$2,000 a month for training with ISIS and an additional US$1,500 for the care of their respective families. However, when they get there and meet with ISIS personnel they are met with aggression and their documents, including passports, are taken away from them.
“They have to realise that when they reach there, their documents will be taken away from them and their lives will be destroyed as well as their families lives,” Ishmael said.
Efforts to reach National Security Minister Edmund Dillon for comment yesterday were unsuccessful and calls to his cellphone went unanswered.