What is IS doing in the Philippines?
The Inquiry
BBC
4.6 • 1.7K Ratings
🗓️ 11 January 2018
⏱️ 23 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In 2017 the black flag of the Islamic State group flew in the southern Philippines as a mixture of local and foreign fighters attacked the Islamic City of Marawi.
While the government did eventually regain control, it took five months to break the siege and many terrorist leaders escaped during the fighting. It's led to fears that the extremist violence could spread.
In this Inquiry we investigate the long history of conflict which provided a fertile place for IS's Islamist ideas to grow, and ask how important the region is to IS now that they're retreating in the Middle East.
(Image: Destroyed buildings in what was the main combat area in Marawi. Photo: Merlyn Manos/Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the inquiry on the BBC World Service with me Ruth Alexander. |
| 0:04.8 | Each week we bring you four expert witnesses answering one pressing question from the news. It was a hot and humid day of thunderstorms in late May last year when gunfire rang out in Marawi City in the southern Philippines. |
| 0:27.0 | It's not that unusual a sound in Marawi. Fighting breaks out among local groups on a semi-regular basis. |
| 0:35.0 | When people looked out of their windows this time though, |
| 0:38.0 | they saw something extraordinary. |
| 0:42.0 | A police van flying a flag, the black flag of the Islamic State Group. |
| 0:47.0 | Within hours, major organizations around the world were running the story, |
| 0:54.6 | with the headline, Morawi under siege from jihadists. |
| 0:58.6 | Photos showed masked men roaming the streets, buildings on fire. |
| 1:05.0 | This wasn't Syria, this wasn't Iraq, this was the Philippines. |
| 1:12.0 | 24 hours in. This was the Philippines. |
| 1:20.0 | 24 hours in, the Army's Public Affairs Chief held a press conference and read from his script. The situation in Maravi has stabilized. |
| 1:24.0 | Security forces are in full control of the situation. |
| 1:29.0 | This was wishful thinking. |
| 1:31.0 | It took the Filipino forces five months |
| 1:36.0 | and help from the US and China |
| 1:38.0 | to regain control of the city. |
| 1:40.0 | The extremists were defeated, but their assault on Marawi was audacious. |
| 1:49.0 | People fear IS was trying to break new ground, attempting to gain a foothold in Asia. |
| 1:55.0 | And in this inquiry we want to know what is. doing in the Philippines. |
| 2:24.0 | It's in the island part of Southeast Asia. |
| 2:26.8 | It's about 7,100 islands. |
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