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| Africa: Subsaharan | |
| US, British Spies Hunt Al-Qaeda-Linked Somali Extremists in Kenya | |
| 2005-06-17 | |
| NAIROBI, 17 June 2005 — US and British agents are now in Kenya tracking members of two Al-Qaeda-linked extremist groups thought to have infiltrated the country from Somalia to set up terrorism cells, a senior Kenyan official said yesterday. Kenyan government spokesman Alfred Mutua said the spies had come to the east African nation to follow up intelligence suggesting that operatives from Al-Ittihad Al-Islamiya and Al-Takfir Wal-Hijra had crossed the border recently. "We have agents here from the American government, from the British government and other governments who are here working," he told reporters at a news conference in Nairobi. "They come, they go, they follow their leads." "We have been investigating a lot of these so-called cells, so-called organizations and so-called groupings," Mutua said. "A lot of them are just suspicions and hearsay and this is one of the cases we are looking into to find out if there is any authenticity (to it)," he said. An official with the British embassy in Nairobi declined to comment specifically on Mutua's remarks but confirmed that Britain and Kenya were now actively cooperating on counter-terrorism. "I can confirm that we are in contact with Kenyan authorities and we cooperate where possible," the official said. The two groups in question are both suspected of having strong ties to Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network, which has claimed responsibility for two deadly suicide attacks in Kenya. In August 1998, two car bombs went off almost simultaneously outside the embassies of the United States in Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam in neighboring Tanzania, killing 224 people and injured around 5,000. Then, in November 2002, a vehicle packed with explosives drove into the lobby of an Israeli-owned hotel near the port city of Mombasa and detonated, killing 15 people and the three presumed suicide bombers. Both attacks, and an attempt to shoot down an Israeli airliner leaving Mombasa on the same day as the hotel bombing, were claimed by Al-Qaeda, prompting foreign governments to issue terrorism alerts for Kenya and east Africa. Washington says that the estimated 2,000-strong Al-Ittihad Al-Islamiya, which wants to impose Islamic law throughout lawless Somalia, are linked to Al-Qaeda and have a presence in Kenya and Ethiopia. Al-Takfir Wal-Hijra is now believed to have cells in Mogadishu from where it is looking to expand, according to intelligence officials who believe lawless Somalia is a potential breeding ground and base for terrorists.
In 2003, a UN panel said the country's arms free-for-all makes it a convenient springboard for groups such as Al-Qaeda to launch attacks in the region. | |
| Posted by:Steve |
| #1 We'll need local help. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2005-06-17 17:33 |