US offers $3 million reward for ISIS propaganda chief

The US State Department is intensifying its search for high-ranking members of ISIS, offering a $3 million reward for information leading to the location or identification of the terrorist group’s media chief.

Mohammed Khadir Musa Ramadan, also known as Abu Bakr Al Gharib, is from Jordan and is a senior leader and key propagandist for ISIS.

“Ramadan has played a key role in ISIS’s propaganda operations to radicalise, recruit and incite individuals around the globe. He has overseen the planning, co-ordination and production of numerous propaganda videos, publications and online platforms that included brutal and cruel scenes of torture and mass execution of innocent civilians,” the state department said in a statement released on Thursday.

It said Ramadan is one of the group’s “longest-serving senior media officials” and that he “oversees the group’s daily media operations, including the management of content from ISIS’s dispersed global network of supporters”.

The US, which heads the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, has stepped up its hunt for the group’s senior figures since its former leader, Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi, was killed in a US operation in north-west Syria in October, despite Washington pulling American troops out of the country the same month.

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Officials said shortly afterwards that the US wanted to bolster the fight against ISIS in northeastern Syria.

Last week, Mutaz Numan Abd Nayif Najm Al Jaburi, who is believed to be among the top ISIS leaders, was killed in a coalition air strike in Deir Ezzor, eastern Syria. The US had put a $5 million bounty on his head, and the operation was aided by the Syrian Democratic Forces.

The State Department has a “rewards for justice” bounty fund of hundreds of millions of dollars for the capture of 44 terrorists viewed as posing the gravest threat to security.

A bounty of $25 million was offered for Al Baghdadi, while $1 million was offered for Hamza bin Laden, the son of former Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden, who was killed in an air strike in September.

Ayman Al Zawahiri, the leader of Al Qaeda and a former leader of the Egyptian arm of Islamic Jihad, tops the current most wanted list with a reward of up to $25 million.

In March, two US service members were killed in Iraq while advising Iraqi Security Forces on a mission against ISIS.

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Defence review at a glance

• Increase defence spending to 2.5% of GDP by 2027 but given “turbulent times it may be necessary to go faster”

• Prioritise a shift towards working with AI and autonomous systems

• Invest in the resilience of military space systems.

• Number of active reserves should be increased by 20%

• More F-35 fighter jets required in the next decade

• New “hybrid Navy” with AUKUS submarines and autonomous vessels

EXPATS

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What is the FNC?

The Federal National Council is one of five federal authorities established by the UAE constitution. It held its first session on December 2, 1972, a year to the day after Federation.
It has 40 members, eight of whom are women. The members represent the UAE population through each of the emirates. Abu Dhabi and Dubai have eight members each, Sharjah and Ras al Khaimah six, and Ajman, Fujairah and Umm Al Quwain have four.
They bring Emirati issues to the council for debate and put those concerns to ministers summoned for questioning.
The FNC’s main functions include passing, amending or rejecting federal draft laws, discussing international treaties and agreements, and offering recommendations on general subjects raised during sessions.
Federal draft laws must first pass through the FNC for recommendations when members can amend the laws to suit the needs of citizens. The draft laws are then forwarded to the Cabinet for consideration and approval.
Since 2006, half of the members have been elected by UAE citizens to serve four-year terms and the other half are appointed by the Ruler’s Courts of the seven emirates.
In the 2015 elections, 78 of the 252 candidates were women. Women also represented 48 per cent of all voters and 67 per cent of the voters were under the age of 40.

Sole survivors

Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.