India, Malaysia agree to proactively engage against IS menace

India and Malaysia have agreed to proactively engage to combat the menace of IS activities, an official statement said on Monday.

In his delegation level meeting with the visiting Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister Dato Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said: "We are concerned about the danger of enhanced activities of Islamic State (IS) in democratic countries like India and Malaysia. They have started using our countries as recruiting ground and attract our youngsters with their extremist ideology."

"If we do not address it internally, and if we do not cooperate with each other through strong intelligence sharing, we will find it increasingly difficult to stop this ideology from poisoning the minds of our youngsters," he added.

The Union Home Minister proposed more regular meetings of the Joint Working Group on counter-terrorism and transnational crimes besides regular meetings under the ambit of the MoU on Cyber Security Cooperation signed during the visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Malaysia in November last year.

Singh said the MHA was studying the comments of Malaysia on the draft MoU on Combating Transnational Crime and hoped it would be signed expeditiously. He also hoped that the MoU on Transfer of Sentenced Prisoners would be fast-tracked.

He also lauded the Malaysian government for its cooperation over the last few years in apprehending some of the terrorists who were wanted in India.

"We appreciate the close cooperation between our security agencies, particularly the Malaysian Special Branch on counter-terrorism which has been working closely with the Intelligence Bureau," he added.

The two sides also discussed the issues such as Extradition Treaty and Fake Indian Currency Notes (FICN).