KABUL: (Middle East Press) A US congressman has expressed concerns that hundreds of Americans with links to ISIL Takfiri terrorists may return to the country with their US passports and engage in acts of terror.
“I’m very concerned because we don’t know every single person that has an American passport that has gone and trained and learned how to fight,” said Mike Rogers, a Michigan Republican lawmaker that heads the House Intelligence Committee, in Sunday remarks.
Rogers noted that these American citizens have at least once traveled, participated and trained with the terrorists and that US intelligence service is currently tracking them.
If these Americans have helped ISIL, they should be charged under laws that ban US citizens from assisting terrorists, he added.
“ISIL would like to have a Western-style attack to continue this concept that they are the leading jihadist group in the world,” Rogers noted.
In the meantime, US President Barack Obama said in a statement Thursday that his administration lacked a strategy to address the growing threat of ISIL terrorism.
Obama said he was not planning to extensively develop US military action against ISIL anytime soon, despite repeated recent pledges suggesting such actions.
His remarks were greeted with strong criticism on Capitol Hill.
The head of the Senate Intelligence Committee says Obama has been “too cautious” in dealing with the ISIL terrorist group.