Iraqi security forces and allied Shiite Popular Mobilization Forces and Sunni tribal fighters, take combat positions outside in Fallujah, 40 miles west of Baghdad, Iraq, (AP Photo/Rwa Faisal)
By Cathy Burke
NEWSMAX
Sunni extremists from terrorist regions overseas are sneaking into the United States across its southern border with the help of smugglers in South America, The Washington Free Beacon reports.
Citing a U.S. South Command intelligence report, the Free Beacon reports “special interest aliens” — described by the government as those posing a potential terrorism threat who come from 34 nations in the Middle East, Africa, Southwest Asia, Central Asia, and East Asia — are working with an unidentified smuggling network to slip across the U.S. border with Mexico.
“Networks that specialize in smuggling individuals from regions of terrorist concern, mainly from the Afghanistan-Pakistan region, the Middle East, and East Africa, are indeed a concern for Southcom and other interagency security partners who support our country’s national security,” spokeswoman Army Col. Lisa A. Garcia tells the Free Beacon.
She did not specifically mention the intelligence report, the newspaper adds.
“There are major hubs that serve as entry points into the region for migrants from those areas of concern attempting to enter the [United States] along our border with Mexico.”
Garcia tells the Free Beacon last year “we saw a total of 331,000 migrants enter the southwestern border between the [United States] and Mexico” and “of that we estimate more than 30,000 of those were from countries of terrorist concern.”
“This makes the case for [Donald] Trump’s wall,” one security official tells the Free Beacon. “These guys are doing whatever they want to get in the country.”
Last month, the GOP presidential nominee also called for “extreme vetting” of people from countries connected to terrorism.
In February, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper testified at a Senate hearing that Islamic State terrorists would try to infiltrate the United State posing as immigrants.
“That’s one technique they’ve used is taking advantage of the torrent of migrants to insert operatives into that flow,” Clapper said. “As well, they also have available to them — and are pretty skilled at phony passports so they can travel ostensibly as legitimate travelers as well.”