In response to concerns by the West and opposing Maldives Democratic Party about the increase of radicalization in Maldives, spokesperson of Maldives Police Service, Ahmed Shifan unequivocally stated that the issue has been grossly exaggerated, and the situation is well under control.
NewsIn.Asia quoted Shifan who said "the government is fully geared to keep track of what is happening and nip any radicalization in the bud."
"With the help of foreign agencies, including those of the US, we have been able to track down some Maldivians on the Turkey-Syria border. We have remanded them and put them through a de-radicalization process," Shifan was further quoted by the news agency.
The situation came into light when the Maldivian opposition claimed that about 250 or more locals were fighting alongside Islamist groups at Syria. In addition to this, the US Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia, Alice G. Wells claimed that the Maldives has the highest per capita representation in the ISIS compared to other countries.
However this was countered by Maldivian Defense Minister, Adam Shareef Umar as he claimed the figure was not above 49 individuals.
Earlier this year, three Maldivians were charged with terrorism after they were arrested from the Turkey-Syria border, while another man who had attempted to cross into Syria was arrested and repatriated back to Maldives.
Similarly two Maldivians with links to ISIS were arrested from Malaysia when the authorities had a crackdown on a planned bomb attack on the country's soil. Both men were attempted to enter Syria using Singapore as transit point.
Several cases mounting to the issue had led the opposition to believe and speculate that large portions of Maldivian citizens, influenced under radicalism and radical clerics were attempting to join foreign conflicts by associating with Islamist militant groups.
It was implied that the opposition had perceived the Maldives currently is under threat of violent radicalization and increase of such groups or organizations.
However the Maldivian government has stated the issue has been widely exaggerated and radicalization in general and terrorist activism, are individualistic and not collective or mass phenomena in the Maldives.
"Radicalization is at the individual level. There is no Wahabi institution or group as such here. It is not a group or mass phenomenon," Ahmed Shifan who is the Head of Strategy and Legal Affairs in Maldives Police Service said to NewsIn.Asia.
In the meantime Maldivian Ambassador in Sri Lanka, Mohamed Hussain Shareef said "there has not been a single terrorist incident in the resort islands for the world to shout about," countering opposition remarks and allegations of terrorist groups on the rise.
Police spokesperson had also added that usually such radical indoctrination is presented and taught by scholars and lecturers who have attended 'shady' institutes at Pakistan and Afghanistan where terrorist organizations operate broadly with several religious clerics under them, teaching the citizens of an extremist set of ideologies.
In order to counter this such teachers or lecturers in Maldives are "re-orientated" following complaints or exposure of their conduct.
"Punishment does not work in such cases," Shifan referred to the concept of countering violent religious indoctrination of scholars and clerics alike, as Maldives promotes reformation or rehabilitation rather than punishment.
