The world’s most wanted terrorist, the ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, has reportedly reemerged, for the first time since 2014, in an eighteen-minute video designed to rally the thousands of followers who still heed his call on at least four continents.
Analysts have credited the resurfacing as a way and a statement to show that ISIS is still a threat despite recent obliteration and defeat by US-backed troops in Baghouz, Syria. The video online shows Baghdadi talking to a group of followers sitting with him on the floor of a bare, whitewashed room with an AK-47 rifle was perched by his side. He further mentions the activities of ISIS provinces in places like Sri-Lanka which killed close to 300 people during Easter weekend as well as fighters in Mali and Burkina Faso, Africa.
He further highlighted the close to a hundred attacks conducted by the various provinces across the globe despite ISIS-Central losing ground in Iraq and Syria. Baghdadi is believed to be hiding somewhere in the desert along the Syria-Iraq border, probably on the Iraq side, according to U.S. officials.
Baghdadi is one of the most wanted men in the world. The U.S. is offering a reward of up to $25 million for information leading to his location. Under his leadership, ISIS has killed thousands of civilians around the world.
