Region must stop Shabaab from exporting terror

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Nobody is surprised that Somalia’s Al Shabaab extremists have formally announced they are joining Al Qaeda, the global terror group they have been affiliated to for years.

As US counter-terrorism officials have pointed out, the recent video announcement by Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri and Al Shabaab senior leader Ahmed Abdi Godane, also known as ‘Abu Zubeyr’, only confirms what has been common knowledge for some time.

It may be little more than an attempt to boost morale at a time several key leaders have been killed and no major attacks against the West have been attempted in close to six years.

Factions of Harakat Al Shabaab Al Mujahideen linked to leaders like ‘Abu Zubeyr’ and his alleged successor Ibrahim Haji Jama Mee’aad or ‘Ibrahim al-Afghani’ share a long history with Al Qaeda and its affiliates.

Over the last few years, Somalia’s home-grown terrorists have provided safe haven for Al Qaeda operatives responsible for the attacks in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 that announced the resurgence of Osama bin Laden’s group. Direct links have also been established with Al Qaeda in Yemen and with West Africa’s Boko Haram.

In the wake of Ethiopia’s US-backed invasion of Somalia in 2006, Al Shabaab attracted a hard-core contingent of foreign fighters with a decidedly ‘internationalist’ agenda and strong Al Qaeda credentials.

The killing of prominent leaders such as Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan in 2009 and Fazul Abdallah Mohammed aka ‘Harun Fazul’ last year, have done little to stamp out the Al Qaeda influence. Instead, the presence of foreign terrorists has subsumed Al Shabaab’s nationalist agenda and shaped international reaction to the group.

Since June last year, the United States military has been conducting an undeclared ‘drone war’ in Somalia, targeting some of these internationalist factions.

‘Operation Linda Nchi’, Kenya’s military involvement in Somalia, was launched in response to the growing threat and constant provocations of Al Shabaab’s internationalist factions. It came in the wake of several provocations involving foreign tourists and Kenyan security officers.

At its outset, Kenyan diplomats were quick to point out that they were leaving the door open to a dialogue with nationalist elements of Al Shabaab ready to work with Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government.

This line of argument was quickly shut down in favour of a simpler message: No negotiating with terrorists. But with ‘Operation Linda Nchi’ having slowed to a crawl in its third month, a strong case can be made for talks between TFG and the more nationalist factions of Al Shabaab.

The international community’s mistake with the Islamic Courts Union half a decade ago, was to refuse to engage its moderate voices in the rebuilding of Somalia in favour of unpopular warlords.

Ethiopia’s mistake was to provide propaganda fodder and political space for remnants of the ICU to oppose the TFG. Kenya has taken a more cautious approach in its military actions to avoid civilian casualties that would invite a similar backlash.

It would be smart to also drive a wedge between nationalist and internationalist factions of Al Shabaab in preparation for the battle for hearts and minds that comes after the war.

Al Shabaab presents a danger, both regionally and internationally, that goes well beyond ‘Operation Linda Nchi’ and the offensives in and around Mogadishu with the African Union Mission in Somalia, Amisom.

There is a widespread and justified fear that the hundreds of foreign fighters receiving terrorist training and radicalisation in the conflict are poised to export terror to their home countries should the group lose the territory it holds and be forced underground.

The United States counts more than 30 nationals among the terrorists, with some of the 45 or so known to have been recruited killed in battle or as suicide bombers.

There are dozens of other Westerners, East Africans and foreigners from around the world. Their effectiveness as recruiters can be greatly reduced by conducting the campaign in Somalia responsibly.