Many western youth wanting to join ‘jihad’ after failed Times Square bombing: Taliban

NEW YORK - The bungled Times Square bombing plot has actually helped the Taliban gain wide scale publicity which has resulted in more and more youngsters like Faisal Shahzad wanting to join the ‘jihad’ (holy war) against the west, a top Afghan Taliban leader has said.

“We’ve got more publicity from this one failed bombing in New York than from more than 100 bombings in Afghanistan,” a report in the Newsweek magazine quoted the high-ranking Taliban commander, as saying.

The report, however, didn’t disclose the name of the Taliban commander.

He claimed that there are many foreign youngsters like Shahzad, the naturalised American citizen of Pakistan origin who is accused of plotting the Times Square bombing, who send e-mails seeking to join the terror outfit.

“With all this new technology, it’s not difficult to recruit people in the West. It’s hard to contact Al Qaeda. But it’s very easy to get in touch with the Pakistani Taliban,” the Daily News quoted Taliban commander, as adding in the report.

The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has denied any role in the failed bombing plot, but has praised Shahzad’s ‘noble’ work.

However, US agencies are probing the possibility of the TTP and other banned terror group such as the Jaish-e-Muhammed (JeM) financing and helping Shahzad in getting trained in bomb making. (ANI)