I'm John Datchel with my colleagues, Bill Rajo and Hesena Kani.

Bill of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, Hesena Kani of the Hudson Institute.

Bill, I learn from you all the time at the Long War Journal, the Turkestan Islamic Party.

They're very pleased with their uniforms with their weaponry

and they've made a video of themselves for consumption in China who are they bill and what do

they want yes john and thank you very much i appreciate the compliment um the tur Turkestan Islamic Party, this is an Al-Qaeda branch, like full stop. Its leader is his name is Abdullah Hakal Turkestani. It's made up of primarily of Uyghurs, but others from Central Asia. Their goal is to oppose Islamic State in Western China, in Jai Jing province.

But it's a leader.

It is a sworn member of Al Qaeda.

This isn't me telling you.

This is the U.S. Treasury Department designation, I believe, from 2009, that said he's on al-Qaeda's central council, or it's Shoramishleys.

So he's especially designated global terrorist himself.

For some reason, and by the way, Hussein made an excellent point about the terrorist designation list

i concur we need to have a conversation about it the the the trump administration delisted the turkistan

Islamic party but its leader is still especially designated global terrorist um it's fought

alongside the taliban um in afghanistan as part of al-qaeda's network there and it has fighters in Syria

as well and as as Hussein astutely noted they are able to have easy access into Syria

because of the Turkish government so the Turkish and Islamic party I mean I've been following

this group for two decades now he's saying probably for most of his life.

This is a group that is, you know, again, a Salafist jihadist organization.

They love their propaganda.

That video, and if you go to Long War Journal, you could see it.

It's slickly produced, and this is what they're expert at.

...