Several months ago, Ghulam Rasol packed his bag and quietly slipped out of his village in northwest Pakistan. He did not tell his parents, his brother or sister what he was doing or where he was going. They still don't know what happened to him.Rasol decided to leave after being told by mullahs, who had come to his village outside Peshawar, that Afghanistan had been occupied by foreign troops. It was his duty as a good Muslim to kill those infidels, he was told. The 20-year-old had never been out of Pakistan. He knows little about Afghanistan. Yet he decided it was his responsibility to his religion that he should wage jihad by becoming a suicide bomber.
Rasol acknowledges he has never met a foreigner. He can't tell the difference between a Canadian, U.S. or British soldier. Nor does it matter to him. "I cannot distinguish between foreigners and we don't care from which country they are from," he explained through an interpreter. "Whoever is not Muslim are infidels for us."
Today Rasol sits in an Afghan jail in Kabul. He was captured in early February by Afghan security officers before he could carry out his assignment to attack foreign military forces in the northern province of Faryab. Norwegian troops are in that province, although Afghan intelligence officers suggest his main target could have been Hungarian troops also operating in the north. The Pakistani man's plan was to wear an explosive vest and detonate it as he approached a military compound.
Rasol's journey from his village and into Afghanistan to wage jihad is a rare glimpse of the enemy that Canadian and international troops are fighting.
Rasol cannot read or write. He had a job as an assistant to a man who operated a truck. Rasol said he is not a member of the Taliban nor of any of the other groups fighting international forces. "I'm nothing," he explained. "I'm not of the Talib or the mujahedeen."
He decided to devote his life to jihad because the mullahs had told him it was his responsibility to do so. After that Rasol was taken to a nearby madrassa, or religious school, where he received his "education." "They told us that in Afghanistan jihad is allowed, it is legal and they said: 'Go to Afghanistan and start jihad,' " he said. "They told us that we are Muslim and that in Afghanistan there are infidels, so it's our responsibility to go to Afghanistan and do jihad."
Rasol received three weeks' training using an AK-47 assault rifle as well as some basic Dari language skills so he could bluff his way through Afghan police checkpoints if needed. He informed the mullahs at the madrassa he didn't want to kill fellow Muslims but he was willing to fight international troops. "I was ready to blow up myself among Westerns," he said.
Rasol was given the equivalent of $1,200 U.S. to cover the expenses for himself and three other men who slipped into Afghanistan to conduct attacks. The others were not with him when members of the Afghan intelligence agency, the National Directorate of Security (NDS), arrested him in the northern part of the country. NDS officials declined to give specific details about the arrest or how they tracked Rasol, but they say the three other men are still at large somewhere in Afghanistan.
Rasol said the mullahs, who trained him, promised him nothing; for instance, there would be no money for his family after his death. The only time he showed any emotion in an interview was when he was asked about his family back in Pakistan. Rasol began to cry, explaining they did not know he had left for Afghanistan. "When I went to the madrassa I took my suitcase, that's all," he said. "My family will look around for me and they will cry and they will go to the Pakistani government and ask about where I am."
Rasol said if he is released by Afghan authorities he would return to Pakistan to live a peaceful life. "I will go back to my family and I will respect my mother and father and I will obey them," he said. "I was in the wrong direction when I came to Afghanistan. Afghan people are Muslim."
An Afghan court will now decide what sentence he will face, although it's unclear when that might be.