by Jerry Dunleavy
It remains to be seen whether the Virginia trial will provide some justice for the victims of the Abbey Gate attack nearly five years ago.
The recorded words of the alleged co-conspirator in the
deadly Abbey Gate bombing were played for hours during his federal trial
this week in northern Virginia, with the jury hearing the ISIS-K
terrorist confess to conducting reconnaissance ahead of the Kabul
airport attack, denying foreknowledge of it occurring and raising
concerns about his detention by the Pakistanis.
The defendant, Mohammad Sharifullah, also known as “Jafar," has been charged with
a single count of providing and conspiring to provide material support
and resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization – ISIS-K –
which resulted in death. He has pleaded not guilty to the charge in the
Monday through Thursday trial that also included a lengthy list of
government witnesses testifying.
The FBI has said that Sharifullah confessed
to being involved in “route reconnaissance” in the lead-up to the Aug.
26, 2021, Abbey Gate attack, in which a suicide bomber detonated an
explosive vest, killed 11 Marines, one Army soldier, one Navy corpsman,
and an estimated 170 Afghan civilians, while wounding dozens of other
U.S. troops and scores of Afghans in the crowd.
The FBI has also said Sharifullah also confessed to a role
in facilitating a June 2016 suicide bombing attack that killed more than
10 guards tasked with protecting the Canadian embassy. The FBI has
further said Sharifullah also claimed to have trained ISIS-K gunmen for a
deadly attack on a concert hall in Moscow in 2024.
The Thursday testimony of FBI Special Agent Austin Price
was especially critical, as he was one of the FBI agents who interviewed
Sharifullah while he was in Pakistani custody and during the flight
back to the United States.
Price recounted Sharifullah’s confessions to involvement in
prior ISIS-K attacks – including a recon role ahead of the Abbey Gate
attack. He declined to say whether Sharifullah’s capture and detention
in Pakistan had been carried out by that country’s controversial
Inter-Services Intelligence, known as the ISI.
Price was questioned Thursday by Assistant U.S. Attorney John Gibbs and Federal public defender Lauren Rosen.
Sharifullah has said the Pakistanis tried to force him into
a false confession of being a mastermind of the attack and said last
year that his pregnant wife and kids had also been detained by the
Pakistanis.
The trial began Monday with jury selection and opening
arguments in which the Justice Department said Sharifullah confessed to
his role while the defense team insisted the DOJ had the wrong guy – and
that the Taliban may have been involved.
The Justice Department rested its case Thursday, which was followed by the defense lawyers pushing the judge to acquit their client before the jury could consider a verdict.
Many of Sharifullah’s confessions — made to FBI
investigators while in Pakistan, while on an airplane on the way to the
U.S., and at an FBI office in northern Virginia – were played in court
Thursday morning and early afternoon. The quotations in this article are
drawn from transcriptions displayed on the courthouse screens or
translations provided in court testimony.
Sharifullah's capture by Pakistani intelligence, with
alleged help from U.S. spy agencies, was announced by President Donald
Trump at a joint session of Congress in March. Trump has thanked Pakistan
for “helping arrest this monster.” Trump also called Sharifullah “the
top terrorist responsible for that atrocity” at the Kabal airport in
which 13 U.S. service members died.
An ISIS-K suicide bomber named Abdul Rahman al-Logari – who
had been freed by the Taliban from a prison at Bagram Air Base in
mid-August 2021 – mere weeks after the U.S. abandoned the base – has
been identified as having carried out the suicide attack at Abbey Gate.
The Pentagon under President Joe Biden had argued that the attack was not preventable
– going so far as to say it still would have occurred even if the
bomber had remained behind bars rather than being freed by the Taliban –
despite a host of evidence indicating that the attack did not have to
happen the way it did.
The FBI has said Sharifullah was read his "Miranda rights"
by the FBI in March and that he proceeded to tell them he was recruited
into ISIS-K around 2016. The FBI said Sharifullah was imprisoned in
Afghanistan from approximately 2019 until two weeks before the Kabul
airport attack.
The bureau has said Sharifullah was contacted by another
ISIS-K member upon being freed from prison and that the member connected
him with the plot to attack U.S. forces at the airport. The bureau said
ISIS-K members provided Sharifullah
with a motorcycle, funds for a cell phone and instructions on using
social media to communicate with them in the lead-up to the attack.
Sharifullah’s arrest by the Pakistanis
Sharifullah recounted last year that he had been arrested
by Pakistani authorities days before the FBI showed up in Pakistan. He
said that when the Pakistanis came to arrest him at his home in
Balochistan, he sent a warning message to ISIS-K leaders, deleted his
Telegram, and did a factory reset of his phone.
The Pakistanis eventually handed over Sharifullah’s seized phones to the FBI.
Price said, in early March last year, the FBI conducted two
interviews of Sharifullah in Pakistan, two FBI interviews on the plane
ride to the U.S., and one interview with the bureau in northern
Virginia. The FBI repeatedly Mirandized the terrorist and stressed that
it did not matter what the Pakistanis had told him, but rather that all
the U.S. cared about was the truth.
Price also told the defense lawyer during questioning that,
during their first interview in Pakistan, his bureau partner told
Sharifullah that the FBI was working at the behest of the “detaining
service” – presumably the Pakistani ISI. Price told the defense attorney
that, during the second interview, his partner told Sharifullah that
that had been incorrect.
The FBI stayed at a hotel near a Pakistani air base and
Sharifullah appears to have been held at another nearby Pakistani
military base.
The FBI agent told the defense lawyer that he did not
review any statements Sharifullah gave to the Pakistanis, and that he
does not know what the Pakistanis told the ISIS-K member.
While in Pakistan, Sharifullah asked the FBI for a safe
place for his family. The FBI agent said Shairrifullah passed a note to
the FBI agents about two hours into his first interview in Pakistan.
The note said that “these guys want to make me confess”
that when he was freed by the Taliban from Pul-e-Charkhi prison in Kabul
he linked up with ISIS-K leaders and “designed the attack on the Kabul
airport.”
Sharifullah’s note added that “this is not true” and asked the FBI to “please help.”
He claimed the Pakistani ISI made him make a videotape and
told him to say that he and Logari had drafted a suicide bombing plan in
jail. But Sharifullah said Logari had previously been arrested for
attempting a suicide bombing plot in India, and so he didn’t need him to
come up with a suicide bombing idea.
“I’m glad I’m away from those guys … They’re not humans,”
Sharifullah told the FBI of the Pakistanis on the plane ride to the U.S.
The FBI agent said Sharifullah seemed “very smart” and
“very quick” during the interviews, and that “he seemed very street
smart.”
“He was always trying to stay one step ahead of me regarding questions on HKIA,” Price said.
The FBI agent would not answer the defense team’s questions
about whether the Pakistani ISI was involved in arresting Sharifullah.
The judge told the jury that the agent could refuse to disclose
classified information, but that that could give rise to an “inference”
that the answer would be favorable to the defendant.
When asked by the defense lawyer if Sharifullah’s wife is
still in ISI custody, Price said that the answer was both classified and
that he didn’t know.
When asked whether he learned in October that Sharifullah’s
wife is in ISI custody, the agent again said the answer was classified,
and the judge again repeated that the jury could infer that the answer
might help the defendant.
The agent told the defense lawyer that the FBI had sent
requests to Pakistan in April 2025, July 2025 and October 2025, asking
the Pakistani government to provide a witness to testify about
Sharifullah’s confinement and treatment and that the Pakistanis had not
done so.
Price said that “I have no idea” if Sharifullah’s family is still detained by the Pakistanis.
The agent also told the defense team that, while in
Pakistan, Sharifullah had told the FBI agents to “help me for Allah’s
sake” but that this request was never interpreted for Price, so he
didn’t know Sharifullah had said that. Sharifullah had also told the FBI
agents in Pakistan that he had been “hit,” but again, that was not
translated for Price at the time and thus he had not been aware of it.
Sharifullah and the killing of thirteen Americans at Abbey Gate
Sharifullah admitted to a limited role in the lead up to ISIS-K’s deadly Abbey Gate attack.
“They just told me to observe and make sure there were no Taliban checkpoints,” Sharifullah said of his taking from ISIS-K.
The FBI agent asked Sharifullah to say which one, between the Americans or the Taliban, that ISIS-K would rather attack.
“Allah knows,” Sharifullah said, though likely knowing that
ISIS-K would target the U.S. Marines at Abbey Gate rather than the
Taliban.
Sharifullah said that “the decision is not in my hand” but
rather in the hands of ISIS-K leadership, and that “both of them [the
U.S. and the Talibs] to my leadership are the same.”
Sharifullah claimed his leadership did not tell him where
the exact target at the Kabul airport was, who the exact target was, or
how the attack would be conducted, whether a suicide vest, mines, or
another method.
He claimed he was unaware of whom the target might be, suggesting he thought it might be the Taliban or the Afghan Zero Units.
“The gathering of the Taliban were there” and so he
supposedly thought the Taliban might be a target, and not the Americans –
which was not the case. He also claimed he didn’t think about the
possibility that Americans would be killed in an ISIS-K attack.
Sharifullah was shown an aerial photo of HKIA and the
surrounding neighborhood, and he described what he allegedly did for
ISIS-K near the Kabul airport in the lead-up to the attack.
Sharifullah said he was on a motorcycle and drove on a road
somewhat parallel to the airport until he came to a traffic circle. If
he had turned left and headed north, he would have run into the Taliban
and the crowds surrounding the Kabul airfield, but he says he turned
right and headed south into the city instead.
He said his job was to look for checkpoints up to that
traffic circle and then leave. He said that once he reached the traffic
circle he talked on his phone to his boss, who told him to head away
from the airport. Sharifullah said he wasn’t aware of another ISIS-K
member carrying on the recon up to the gate after him.
Sharifullah acknowledged that he gave up info on fellow
ISIS-K members to the Afghan National Directorate of Security while in
prison at Pul-e-Charkhi near Kabul years before, and so ISIS-K
leadership in 2021 was not happy with him and did not trust him much.
He said that even if ISIS-K leadership had trusted him,
they would not have given him a big important job because he had just
gotten out of prison. However, ISIS-K selected Logari, who had just been
freed from Bagram, as the suicide bomber who struck Abbey Gate.
Sharifullah swore to Allah that he was only tasked to
surveil a road near the airport, but that he didn’t know there would be
an attack.
He also said that when doing recon and making sure a path
is clear, an attacker often follows right behind you. He said that when
making sure that there was no Taliban checkpoint, an attack should have
occurred twenty minutes or so later, and so he was surprised when the
bombing didn’t happen until hours later.
He suspected maybe ISIS-K had been testing him, or that
ISIS-K did another follow-up recon mission after he had done his and
prior to the attack.
Sharifullah also first tried to claim that he had family
members killed by Marines after the Abbey Gate attack, but then claimed
that it was unspecified neighbors of his who had been killed.
Sharifullah said the “emirs in Kabul” – the ISIS-K leaders
in the Afghan capital – make decisions about what to strike and claimed
he didn’t know who carried out the attack.
He pointed to “Engineer Shahab” and “Nawab” – ISIS-K top
leader Sanaullah Ghafari and Kabul area ISIS-K commander Qari Nawab – as
the men who likely made the Abbey Gate decision, saying those two “must
have been aware.”
Sharifullah said in the recordings that he had met with
Ghafari, also known as Shahab al-Muhajir, in the lead up to a terrorist
attack back in 2016.
The State Department’s Rewards for Justice lists a reward of $10 million for information on Ghafari.
“In June 2020, ISIS core leadership appointed al-Muhajir,
also known as Sanaullah Ghafari, to be the leader of ISIS-K, a
U.S.-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization,” the rewards page says.
“An ISIS communiqué announcing his appointment described al-Muhajir as
an experienced military leader and one of ISIS-K’s ‘urban lions’ in
Kabul who has been involved in guerrilla operations and the planning of
suicide and complex attacks.”
The State Department adds that Ghafari “is responsible for
approving all ISIS-K operations throughout Afghanistan and arranging
funding to conduct operations.”
Sharifullah also said that in the past he had transported
multiple suicide bombers, and that he could see the bombs under their
clothes and the detonators in their hands. He also acknowledged being at
Pul-e-Charkhi prison at the same time as Logari, but claimed Logari was
in the first ring and that he was in the second.
The defense lawyer later asked Price whether it was true
that there was “no evidence presented [during the trial] that Mr.
Sharifullah was a mastermind” of the Abbey Gate attack, and the agent
replied, “Correct.”
The possibility of Taliban involvement in the Abbey Gate attack
Gibbs, the DOJ attorney, asked Price what credible
information the FBI agent had seen that the Taliban was behind the Abbey
Gate attack.
Rosen immediately objected, and Judge Anthony Trenga sustained the objection, so the agent was not able to answer.
The UN Sanctions Monitoring Team said
in 2020 that some countries noted that most ISIS-K attacks include
“involvement, facilitation, or the provision of technical assistance” by
the Haqqani Network, and that ISIS-K “lacked the capability to launch
complex attacks in Kabul on its own” without Haqqani help. The UN team
also said it had “viewed communication intercepts in the wake of attacks
that were claimed by ISIS-K that were traceable to known members of the
Haqqani Network.”
The UN team said
that “some countries have reported tactical or commander-level
collaboration between ISIL-K and the Haqqani Network.” Taliban spokesman
Zabihullah Mujahid said that “we strongly reject this propaganda” and that “we have nothing in common (and don’t operate cells) with Daesh [ISIS-K].”
The UN monitoring team said
in 2021 that one nation said that Ghafari was “previously a mid-level
commander in the Haqqani Network” and that he continued to maintain
cooperation with the Haqqanis. One UN member state said
in June 2021 that ISIS-K leader Ghafari’s ongoing relationship with the
Haqqanis provided ISIS-K with “key expertise and access to [attack]
networks.”
Gen. Austin Scott Miller, the commander of U.S. Forces in Afghanistan through July 2021, told Congress in 2024 that “I could never verify a Haqqani-ISIS nexus.”
West Point’s Counterterrorism Center published an article
in 2022 stating that Ghafari had joined “Taliban factions affiliated
with the Haqqani network” and “had close links to the Haqqani network’s
senior commanders.”
Canadian embassy attack and Moscow concert hall mass shooting
Sharifullah said he had helped transport the suicide bomber
Irfan or Irfanullah to help him target the Canadian embassy guards in
2016.
“The final decision is made by our superiors," he said. "They give us the final target."
Sharifullah said that the bus was not armored, and “when we
saw that it was a soft target. ... We said that it would be effective
and said let’s do it.” His ISIS-K superiors then allegedly approved it.
Sharifullah said that when he joined ISIS-K, he pledged
allegiance to ISIS’s alleged caliph Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, who has since
been killed by U.S. special forces, and to ISIS-K leader Dr. Naqib or
Dr. Naqibullah, who “brought me under his influence.”
Sharifullah said he met with Ghafari, Naqib, and others
when he and other ISIS-K members were present at a strategy meeting on
targeting the bus.
“Dr. Naqib” and others in ISIS-K “leadership” had approved
the bus attack, he said. Naqib was an ISIS-K deputy leader who was later
eventually killed in a U.S. air strike in 2019.
Sharifullah also told FBI agents in northern Virginia that
he was tasked to help with the Moscow attack in 2024. He said this
included recruiting a friend to record a video firing an AK-47 on a
mountain.
He said ISIS-K member Abu Manzar lived in Moscow and
prepared four gunmen for the attack, and despite Sharifullah saying he
helped with the attack planning, he also said he didn’t know the
specifics of the attack beforehand.
DOJ called a long string of witnesses to testify against Sharifullah
The DOJ called two former Nepalese guards for the Canadian
embassy to the stand, where they recounted the suicide attack against
their bus in 2016.
Georgetown University professor and terrorism expert Bruce
Hoffman also testified for the government and discussed the history of
ISIS-K.
British Warrant Officer Benjamin Wright also testified this
week, where he testified about ferrying wire twists from the Afghan
National Directorate of Security to a U.S. lab at Bagram.
Luke Biggs, a longtime veteran of U.S. Special Operations
Command who works on an evidence exploitation team, also testified about
Sharifullah.
Marine Cpl. Kelsee Lainhart, who served at HKIA and who was
friends with and worked alongside Marine Sgt. Nicole Gee — one of the
thirteen Americans killed at Abbey Gate – also testified about her
experiences at HKIA. Lainhart received serious spinal cord injuries from
the blast, and was treated at Walter Reed National Military Medical
Center
Other U.S. service members at Abbey Gate, along with U.S. government investigators who looked into the bombing also testified.
It was also revealed in court that Sharifullah’s business
card was also found on a hard drive during a raid of an ISIS-K safehouse
in 2019.
Freelance journalist Agnieszka Pikulicka-Wilczewska also testified about an interview she conducted with Sharifullah in 2020 when he was imprisoned in Afghanistan.
“As a Muslim, I was outraged when Americans were shooting
the Quran in Bagram. In France, the Quran was burned many times. This is
our right to fight against these people. From the very first day, I
wanted to kill the Americans and the infidels,” Sharifullah told Al Jazeera in 2020.
Sharifullah had told the outlet that one of his jobs inside
ISIS-K was to “transport explosives for suicide bombers on motorcycles
and planting them in different places [within Kabul].”
A number of Abbey Gate Gold Star family members were present in the courtroom gallery all week to watch the trial proceedings.
Jerry Dunleavy
Source: https://justthenews.com/government/courts-law/sharifullah-confessed-abbey-gate-recon-denied-foreknowledge-raised-concerns
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