ABSTRACT
South-East Asia came into prominence in the global war against terrorism following the seminal terrorist attacks in the USA on 11 September 2001 (9–11). On the heels of Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan in late 2001 directed at al-Qa’ida and its Taliban allies, the arrival of over 600 troops from the USA in the southern Philippines in 2002 was widely regarded as the opening of a new ‘second front’ against global terrorism (BBC News 2002). The focus on the region was supported by evidence uncovered by US Special Forces in Afghanistan, where a surveillance video-tape was found in an al-Qa’ida safe house. The tape revealed a plan to carry out a series of co-ordinated terrorist attacks against Western interests in Singapore, in a joint operation by al-Qa’ida and its regional associate, a hitherto unknown radical network known as the Jemaah Islamiyah (JI). The unmasking of the JI led to arrests of suspected operatives of the group in Singapore in December in 2001 (CNN.com 2003).
