Offshoot of the Islamic State group that established a "caliphate" in Iraq and Syria in 2014. Operates in the lawless borderlands between Pakistan and Afghanistan. America and other Western governments see ISKP as their biggest international terrorist threat.
ISKP has about 4,000-6,000 fighters, including Tajiks, Uzbeks and Turks who mostly operate in eastern Afghanistan and Pakistan's north and south-west. It is considered especially dangerous because it attracts experienced fighters and recruits aggressively online, often encouraging lone-wolf attacks abroad. It adheres to the puritanical Salafist school of Sunni Islam and mainly targets Shia Muslims (including in Iran) along with Westerners and Russians. Despite coming under pressure from Afghan and Pakistani authorities, it "retains the capability and intent to attack Western interests abroad with little to no warning", according to General Michael Kurilla, head of America's Central Command, at a congressional hearing on June 10th 2025.
ISKP carried out a suicide attack in Kabul in August 2021 that killed 13 American service members and about 170 civilians. It killed more than 100 people in a bomb attack in the city of Kerman, Iran, in 2024. One Chinese citizen was killed by ISKP in Afghanistan in January 2025.
At Western governments' request, Pakistan has stepped up joint efforts to kill and capture ISKP leaders. Pakistan arrested the alleged planner of the 2021 Kabul attack in February 2025 and extradited him to America in March, earning rare public praise from Donald Trump. The Taliban have also helped hammer ISKP in Afghanistan. Russia, China and Iran all consider ISKP a serious threat.
Real computer scientists don't write code. They occasionally tinker with `programming systems', but those are so high level that they hardly count (and rarely count accurately; precision is for applications).