NEW YORK: The five missing men from Northern Virginia who were arrested in Sargodha and are being investigated by both Pakistani and US authorities left behind in Virginia an eleven-minute video which is "disturbing", said a CAIR official while appearing on CNN Wednesday evening.
They were on their way to the heart of the Taliban sanctuary in Pakistan’s tribal areas with the intention of training to fight against American troops in Afghanistan, New York Times reported today.
The Sargodha police officer Tahir Gujjar told AP that three of the men are Americans of Pakistani descent, one is of Egyptian descent and the other is of Yemeni heritage.
The young men were taken into custody at the four-room home in a government housing complex belonging to an uncle of the eldest of the group, Umer Farooq, 25, according to Sargodha Police Chief Anwar.
The uncle is an activist linked to Jaish-i-Muhammad, a jihadist group that was implicated in the December 2001 attack on the Indian Parliament in New Delhi and has been branded a terrorist organization by the United States, reported Washington Post.
The Farooq’s had emigrated to the United States 20 years ago from Sargodha and had returned in September to start a computer business, similar to the one they have in the Virginia suburbs close to Washington.
The police identified the others arrested as Ramy Zamzam, 22, a dental student of Egyptian background at Howard University in Washington DC, who was described as a sort of “ringleader”; Waqar Khan, of Pakistani background, who was reported to have family connections in Karachi; Ahmad A. Mini, 20, born in Eritirea; and Aman Hassan Yemer, 18, a native Ethiopian.
“They are U.S. nationals,” Chief Anwar said. “They have valid U.S. passports and valid Pakistani visas.”
Officials at the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said the men — who are in their early 20s and from the Alexandria area of Virginia — disappeared last week. Their families approached CAIR, which informed the FBI and has been working with federal authorities to locate the men and find out why they went to Pakistan.
"The Muslim community has taken the lead in bringing this case to the attention of law enforcement authorities and will offer ongoing cooperation with the FBI as the investigation moves forward," CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad said in a news release.
FBI said in a statement that the agency "is working with families and local law enforcement to investigate the missing students and is aware of the individuals’ arrested in Pakistan."
At least three of those arrested were holding dual U.S.-Pakistani passports, according to an intelligence source cited by Foxnews.
One of the missing students has been identified by a source and online communications as 22-year-old Ramy Zamzam of Alexandria, Va., a dental student at Howard University in Washington, D.C.
FBI agents are also working with Pakistani authorities "to determine their identities and the nature of their business there, if indeed these are the students who had gone missing."
FBI agents have been interviewing family members, friends and classmates of the men in the Washington area. Their names have not been released, and it was unclear Wednesday afternoon where they attend school.
CAIR, a public advocacy group for Muslims in America, held a news conference Wednesday afternoon about the case, where it "urged anyone aware of the missing group’s activities to come forward and warned against the dangers of adopting or promoting extremist religious views." (MAMOSA)
