The State Department on Thursday officially deemed the Islamic State’s arms in Libya, Saudi Arabia and Yemen terrorist organizations.
All three groups emerged as formal branches in November 2014, when the Islamic State’s leader accepted the acolytes’ pledges of fealty, according to the State Department. The joint designation as both foreign terrorist organizations and specially designated global terrorists freezes members’ assets and denies them entry into the U.S.
It also prohibits anyone from “knowingly providing, or attempting or conspiring to provide, material support or resources to, or engaging in transactions with, these organizations, and the freezing of all property and interests in property of these organizations that is in the United States, or come within the United States or the control of U.S. persons,” according to the State Department.
The newly designated terrorist groups are “limited to specific geographic locations in each country,” yet all three “have carried out numerous deadly attacks since their formation,” according to the State Department.
Thursday’s categorization brings the number of officially sanctioned Islamic State branches to eight.
