Somali’s Al-Shabab Join Forces with Al-Qaeda
Mogadishu--Somalia’s dreaded armed Islamist group al-Shabab have joined ranks with al-Qaeda ,following an announcement by the international terror movement’s chief Ayman al-Zawahiri in a video message posted on online Islamic forum.
Zawahiri who took over leadership of the Islamist movement after the death of its founder Osama Bin Laden last year, announced Thursday that the Somali militants were linked with al-Qaeda, terming it as growth of the movement in the Muslim world despite the campaign against it by the West.
"I will break the good news to our Islamic nation, which will... annoy the crusaders, and it is that the Shabab movement in Somalia has joined al-Qaeda," Zawahiri said.
"The jihadist movement is with the grace of Allah, growing and spreading within its Muslim nation despite facing the fiercest crusade campaign in history by the West," he added.
In a response addressed to Zawahiri, al-Shabab leader Ahmed Abdi Godane also known as Mukhtar Abu Zubair said “"We will move along with you as faithful soldiers."
The announcement comes a day after al-Shabab claimed it was behind a suicide bomb attack on Wednesday in the capital, Mogadishu that killed at least 11 people and wounded 34 others.
Al-Shabab, which controls large swathes in central and southern Somalia, is fighting to depose the fragile transitional government propped by the African Union forces.
Recent increased pressure by government and AU forces has seen the group withdraw from the capital, resorting to frequent attacks with suicide bombers, roadside bombs and grenades.
Thursday’s move becomes the first formal welcoming of al-Shabab by the Jihadist movement after the al-Shabab leaders in a past video distributed in 2009, pledged allegiance to then al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
An upcoming one-day conference on Somalia in London in next two weeks is expected to tackle instability and piracy in the war-torn Horn of Africa nation that has had no functional government since ousting of dictatorial leader Siad Barre in 1991.
The killing of al-Qaeda's top leader Osama bin Laden by U.S. forces in Pakistan in May 2011 served a significant blow to the terror ring, which still remains deadly. Its affiliation with other militant groups has gained prominence in recent years, complicating the task of containing the organisation whose networks spread all over the world.
Bamako, Mali
UN Calls on Mali Tuareg to Stop Advance
The United Nations has called on the Tuareg-led MLNA rebels fighting for autonomy in north-eastern Mali to cease attacks, after they had captured the strategic border town of Tinzawatene, forcing the government troops there to withdraw into Algeria.
The fighting followed a three-week desert advance by the rebel forces who say they are fighting to create an independent state in northern Mali, a significant transit and smuggling point in the desert. The rebel push southwards on three fronts has been much aided by Malians returning from Libya in the fighting that erupted in mid-January, displacing over 60,000 people.
“The Secretary-General condemns the use of violence as a means to achieve political objectives,” a spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a statement.
“He therefore calls on the rebel groups to immediately cease their attacks and to engage in dialogue with the Government of Mali to resolve their grievances,” read the statement.
A statement issued Wednesday by the government said its troops had carried out a “tactical withdrawal” from their military base in Tinzawatene into neighbouring Algeria after seven days of fighting in which one soldier was killed and two others wounded.
Hama Ag Sid’Ahmed, a MLNA spokesman said they were in control of the town’s two military barracks and had in their control several military vehicles. Ag Sid’Ahmed said one of their fighters had been killed in the fighting that left another one wounded.
The rebels have said they are open to talks but only for the question of independence for the region, which the government in Bamako has rejected the idea of a breakaway, saying talks could take place after the rebel incursion had been halted.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Thursday that at least 30,000 people from the region are fleeing in “large numbers and some are living in “dire conditions” with no shelter, food or access to clean water.
The regional development bloc ECOWAS sent a special team to Mali on Thursday to assess the extent of the security and humanitarian problems caused in the fighting which has spread to several other towns.
Tuareg nomads are present throughout the Sahel region of Africa where they have staged several uprisings against their respective governments in Mali and Niger.