AN official of the US Department of State said the Islamic State (IS) continues to recruit new members in Southeast Asia, including in the Philippines, not to get them to join the fight in Syria and in Iraq but to launch acts of terrorism in their hometowns.

Irfan Saeed, director of the Department of State’s Office of Countering Violent Extremism, said the US had destroyed so-called caliphates in Syria and Iraq, effectively stopping IS operations and travel, but that didn’t stop the group from getting new recruits.

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