Maharashtra and Turkey will now share intelligence in their fight against ISIS, especially on youth travelling from India to join the Islamic State.
The State government has signed an agreement with the Turkish government on exchanging vital clues, and sharing technical assistance in tracking and countering ISIS propaganda on the Internet. The State has signed a preliminary agreement for exchanging technical know-how on software and applications used by the Turkish intelligence in tracking ISIS on the Internet.
A team of state officials including State Minister for Home Ranjit Patil met their Turkish counterparts at the International Convention on Strong Cities at Antalya, Turkey last week. The Maharashtra team took up as many as four cases of youth from Maharashtra and Mumbai attempting to join ISIS, and learnt how state agencies could have handled the investigations better. The theme of the conference was on strengthening cities’ response to terror, with as many as 35 leading cities of the world participating to share intelligence and expertise.
Patil told The Hindu , “We definitely were looking to find out ways to fight ISIS propaganda on the Internet, especially what gets communicated via smartphones. In the cases presented to them from our side, most youth had used a smartphone to consume ISIS literature and messages.”
Other cities to have participated other than Mumbai were New York, Copenhagen, Birmingham and London among others. A common consensus was arrived at on fighting ISIS on a social level, where the state delegation also gave a presentation on the creation of Force One, a special unit to fight terror. A senior official of the home department said,
