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| Somali Americans `recruited' to join insurgency |
| 2009-11-24 |
| US prosecutors yesterday charged eight men with recruiting immigrants from Somalia to join the Islamist insurgency in the African country, in one of the biggest US terrorism investigations since 9/11. According to court documents unsealed yesterday, the eight organised a network in the US that enlisted and financed about 20 men, mostly from the Somali community in Minneapolis, to become fighters with the al-Shabaab group, designated a terrorist organisation by Washington. Five of the recruits were killed fighting in Somalia, including at least one believed to have carried out the first suicide bombing by an American citizen, according to US officials. In Australia, four men of Somali and Lebanese descent aged between 22 and 26, with alleged links to al-Shabaab, were arrested in August in a joint counter-terror police operation in Melbourne. The four were accused of plotting a suicide attack on Holsworthy army base in Sydney. The US investigation is among several that raised concerns over the recruitment of US Muslims by radical groups. The case represents the largest group of US citizens suspected of joining an extremist movement affiliated with al-Qa'ida, senior officials said. Officials previously saw the threat in the US as less than in Europe, which has a large immigrant Muslim population. "The national security implications are serious," said Ralph Boelter, special agent in charge of the FBI's Minneapolis office. "This is the closest thing we've seen" to the homegrown terrorism recruitment in Britain. Somali community leaders say the recruits appear to have been motivated by Ethiopia's US-backed invasion of Somalia three years ago and wanted to help the Islamist group oust foreigners. Those charged include Cabdulaahi Ahmed Faarax and Abdiweli Yassin Isse, both US residents. An FBI affidavit alleges Mr Faarax and others met at a Minneapolis mosque and at a private home in 2007 and that Mr Faarax claimed to have fought in the war and encouraged other men to join the fight in Somalia. Prosecutors allege Mr Isse described plans for a jihad against the Ethiopian forces and raised money for plane tickets under the guise of sending young men to Saudi Arabia to study the Koran. Both men left the US by the Mexican border near San Diego and are now outside the country. Also charged is Mahamud Said Omar, a Somali US resident arrested on terror charges in The Netherlands this month. The US is seeking his extradition. FBI director Robert Mueller has said the case was worrying because it shows young men raised in the US can be recruited by terrorists from overseas and trained to conduct attacks. |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #1 "Somali Americans" Forgot the hyphen! That's what makes them "real" Americans, don't'cha know.... |
| Posted by: Uncle Phester 2009-11-24 20:55 |