Emirates Leaks monitors: UAE secretly supported ISIS in Syria and Iraq
Various sources revealed that the UAE had supported ISIS in Syria and Iraq with Japanese Toyota SUVs, after secret American investigations were opened with this regard.
As these cars appeared in most of the ISIS’s visual publications, the US administration decided in 2015 to open an investigation into the terrorist organization’s possession of a large fleet of jeeps and four-wheel drive vehicles (Land Cruiser and Hilux), numbered more than 12,000, two-thirds of which are in Syria and the rest in Iraq despite the fact that Toyota had stopped sales to Syria since the end of 2011.
The investigation was conducted into how ISIS owned these cars and how they were delivered to ISIS-controlled areas in Syria and Iraq.
The American investigators have concluded that the volume of cars in ISIS’ possession is greater than countries’, and that these cars can only enter Syria by land.
The American investigators demanded that Toyota provide clarifications on how the organization obtained thousands of modern Toyota cars and demanded detailed lists of the numbers and data of cars that were exported to the Middle East, along with sales contracts, shipping and export data.
Toyota responded, fearing penalties and legal accountability, by handing over to the required information and records of those cars with import and export certificates and even sales invoices and shipping data.
Toyota confirmed to the investigators that it sold the UAE and Saudi Arabia 45,000 Toyota Land Cruiser and Hilux cars during 2012, 2013, and 2014, and it was found that all cars that were confiscated from ISIS have their numbers in compliance with the sales regulations of Riyadh and Abu Dhabi.
Toyota stated that these cars were sold through its agent in the UAE (Al-Futtaim Motors), and its agents in Saudi Arabia, Abdul Latif Jameel Company and Al-Bazai Company.
Later, Al-Futtaim Motors claimed that a Syrian named Ihab Abu Faour had bought 6,000 cars and exported them to Syria. While the Abdul Latif Jameel Company claimed that these cars were bought by Hamsho Trading Group in Syria.
