Islamic State can make fake Syrian passports: US report

WASHINGTON: A US government agency report has warned that Islamic State has the ability to create fake Syrian passports, a federal official confirmed on Friday.
A spokeswoman for US Immigration and Customs Enforcement confirmed the contents of a story by CNN on Friday about the report, but declined to provide a copy of the report.
The report says Islamic State has access to Syrian government passport printing machines and blank passports, raising the possibility the travel documents could be faked, CNN reported, citing a law enforcement source. The CNN source added that there was also concern that because the militant group had access to biographical and fingerprint data on Syrian citizens, there was also a possibility of identity theft.
ABC News, which first reported the story on Thursday, said the report was released to law enforcement by the Homeland Security Investigations agency last week and raised the possibility that militants could use the documents to travel to the United States.
"Since more than 17 months passed since Raqqa and Deir ez-Zour fell to ISIS, it is possible that individuals from Syria with passports 'issued' in these ISIS-controlled cities or who had passport blanks, may have traveled to the US," ABC News quoted the report as saying.
State Department spokesman John Kirby, asked at a briefing on Friday about the ABC report, replied: "We have been aware of reports, not just in the press, that they may have obtained this capability."
FBI Director James Comey told a Senate committee hearing on Wednesday: "The intelligence community is concerned that they [Islamic State] have the ability, the capability to manufacture fraudulent passports, which is a concern in any setting."

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U.S. allies will not relent in fight against Islamic State, says Obama

U.S. President Barack Obama on Sunday said the United States and its allies would not relent in the fight against Islamic State extremists and would hunt down their leaders and cut off the group's financing.

“Destroying [Islamic State] is not only a realistic goal, were going to get it done,” he said ata a news conference after a meeting of Asian leaders in Malaysia.

“We will destroy them. We will take back land they are currently in, take out their financing, hunt down leadership, dismantle their networks, supply lines and we will destroy them.”

Mr. Obama said it "would be helpful" if Russia directed its focus on tackling Islamic State and he hoped Moscow would agree to a leadership transition in Syria that meant its president stepping down.

Ban urges Russia, U.S. to cooperate on terrorism

The United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that he has urged Russia and the United States to cooperate on rooting out terrorism.

"All these terrorists and ideology extremists should be defeated in the name of humanity," he said at the annual East Asia Summit this year hosted in Kuala Lumpur.

"In that regard, we need to unite. We need to show global solidarity to address the common enemy of ISIL, Daesh, some other extremists and terrorist groups," he said, referring to Islamic State.

Mr. Obama said at the same summit the United States and its allies would not relent in the fight to combat Islamic State extremists and would hunt down their leaders and cut off the group's financing.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday he wanted global cooperation to combat terrorism after Islamist militants killed 19 people, including six Russians, in an attack on a luxury hotel in Mali.

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UN approves resolution urging action against IS

The UN Security Council unanimously approved a French-sponsored resolution calling on all nations to redouble and coordinate action to prevent further attacks by Islamic State terrorists and other extremist groups.

The resolution says the Islamic State group “constitutes a global and unprecedented threat to international peace and security” and expresses the council’s determination “to combat by all means this unprecedented threat.”

The measure is the 14th terrorism-related resolution adopted yesterday by the UN’s most powerful body since 1999.

It was adopted a week after violent extremists launched a coordinated gun and bomb assault that killed 130 people in Paris which the Islamic State claims it carried out.

It also comes eight days after twin suicide bombings in Beirut killed 43 people, and three weeks after a Russian airliner crashed over Egypt’s Sinai peninsula killing all 224 people on board both attacks also claimed by IS.

The resolution “unequivocally condemns in the strongest terms” these and earlier “horrifying terrorist attacks” carried out by the Islamic State this year in Souses, Tunisia and Ankara, Turkey.

The resolution calls on UN member states “that have the capacity to do so to take all necessary measures” against the Islamic State group and all other violent extremist groups “to eradicate the safe haven they have established over significant parts of Iraq and Syria.”

This does not constitute an authorization for military action, however, because the resolution is not drafted under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter which is the only way the United Nations can give a green light to the use of force.

The resolution urges UN member states “to intensify their efforts to stem the flow of foreign terrorist fighters in Iraq and Syria and to prevent and suppress the financing on terrorism.”

In September 2014, U.S. President Barack Obama chaired a Security Council meeting where members unanimously adopted a resolution requiring all countries to prevent the recruitment and transport of would—be foreign fighters preparing to join terrorist organisations such as the Islamic State group.

In February, the council adopted a resolution aimed at tightening its crackdown on financing terrorist groups through illicit oil sales, trading in antiquities and paying ransom for hostages.

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