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Support And Defiance For British Anti-Terror Initiative
LONDON, March 1 (News Agencies) - Britain's decision to ban 21 groups from operating within the country because of concerns over terrorism has met with a varied response around the world, from open defiance by freedom fighters in Pakistan and Iran, to whole-hearted support by governments in India, Turkey and Sri Lanka.
Home Secretary Jack Straw said he had taken the measure to stop Britain being used a springboard for "terror" campaigns and as a fund-raising platform for a disparate collection of separatist, opposition and activist organizations operating in the Middle East, South Asia, North Africa and southern Europe, of which Muslims are the major population in the regions.
"I am entirely satisfied that the organizations ... are concerned in terrorism," said Straw in a written statement.
India welcomed the ban, as the list included the Lashkar-e-Taiba Islamic group.
"We believe that this measure taken by the British government will contribute significantly in strengthening the international community's resolve to combat terrorism," a spokesman said.
The ban also included Sri Lanka's Tamil Tiger rebels, who India say assassinated former premier Rajiv Gandhi in May 1991 and Islamic groups active in India.
Sri Lanka Media Minister Anura Priyadharshana Yapa said: "No world leader is safe with the kind of suicide bombing capability that is with the LTTE."
However, former Tamil legislator Dharmalingam Sidharthan said he believed clandestine LTTE fund-raising would continue in Britain. "Politically, diplomatically and for the morale of their cadres, the ban will be a problem," Sidharthan said.
LTTE chief negotiator Anton Balasingham was quoted from London as saying the ban would encourage the "repressive Sri Lankan regime to be more uncompromising, intransigent and to adopt a military path of state violence, terrorism and war."
Pakistan-based groups Harkat ul-Mujahideen, Jaishe Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Taiba were unrepentant about their freedom struggle against Indian rule in Kashmir.
"We are not bothered about it and we will continue our sacred mission to extend military help to the oppressed Muslims in Kashmir," Lashkar-e-Taiba spokesman Yahya Mujahid told AFP.
"Our struggle is against the injustice of 1947 by the British rulers at the time of partition of the subcontinent, when the Muslim majority in Kashmir was given to India."
Harkat ul-Mujahideen said the decision stemmed from a bias against Islam. "We believe the British government's decision is anti-Muslim and meant to please the Jews and Hindus," a spokesman said.
Jaishe Mohammed chief Maulana Masood Azhar said Britain's decision would only fuel Indian atrocities in Kashmir.
"Kashmir is a disputed issue and the British government will provide an excuse to the Indian government to carry on its human rights violations against the oppressed Muslims," he said.
The Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement said from Damascus the ban favored "Zionist terrorism".
"Britain is historically favorable to Israel and supports Zionist terrorism," Islamic Jihad spokesman Abu Tarek told AFP. "Calling Palestinian resistance organizations 'terrorist', aims at defending the terrorist acts which are committed by the Zionists daily against children, women and old people in Palestine."
Turkey, a majority Muslim country, welcomed the decision to include condemned leader Abdullah Ocalan's armed Kurdish activists and an extreme-left Turkish group on the list of 21.
"We are pleased with [Britain's] decision on the fight against terrorism," Turkish foreign ministry spokesman Huseyin Dirioz said.
And in Iran, the People's Mujahedeen, the main armed opposition group, accused the British government of appeasing Tehran's Islamic regime.
"Proscription of the Mujahedeen is nothing new and is only a continuation of London's appeasement of the mullahs' regime," the organization said in a statement.
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