Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Young British-born Muslims and al Shabaab

In October 2010, two 18-year-old men from Britain were arrested on Kenya's border with war-torn Somalia. The father of one of them said that he believed his son had been brainwashed and was on his way to join an Islamic holy war. Kenyan authorities quickly sent the two British-born men - one of Somali ancestry, the other of south Asian descent - back to Britain. The arrests, which occurred just as Kenyan security forces launched an air and ground incursion into Somalia, shone a light on an increasing concern for British and U.S. counter-terrorism experts - the interest of young British Muslims in joining al Shabaab. The Somali-based Islamic militant group is aligned with al Qaeda and its Yemen-based affiliate, Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). European officials say that a steady stream of British citizens and residents have been making their way to Somalia to join up with bands of al-Shabaab militants who patrol, and in some cases control, patches of Somalia's fragmented territory. Some of the group's British-born recruits come from within insular communities of Somali immigrants to Britain, based in working class neighborhoods of London and other cities. But officials say that Shabaab has also succeeded in recruiting Britons of much more diverse backgrounds, including British residents of Pakistani ancestry and Muslim converts with ethnic Anglo-Saxon pedigrees. The officials say that dozens of English-speaking Westerners have traveled to Somalia to join or train with Shabaab. British authorities believe that the potential problems posed by Britons connecting with al Shabaab could pose threats not just to Somalia and its neighbors - where investigators believe Shabaab is extending its activities - but to Britain as well. The British authorities are trying to spot and track people who travel to Somalia from Britain and might have come into contact with Shaabab. The problem is not altogether new. John Sawers, head of Britain's Secret Intelligence Service, otherwise known as MI-6, said in 2010 that Al-Qaeda affiliates in Yemen, Somalia and North Africa pose real threats to Britain. About the same time, Jonathan Evans, head of Britain's domestic Security Service, also known as MI-5, spoke of plots against Britain that were originating in Somalia and nearby Yemen following counter-terrorism successes against al Qaeda's central leadership in Pakistan. Authorities believe that the problem has only continued to grow. Somalia resembles 1990s Afghanistan as a potential seedbed for terrorism, Evans said, adding: "I am concerned that it is only a matter of time before we see terrorism on our streets inspired by those who are today fighting alongside al Shabaab. Counter-terrorist capabilities have improved in recent years but there remains a serious risk of a lethal attack taking place," Evans said. Investigators in Europe and the United States point to a recruitment video, circulated via the Internet late in 2010, as evidence of Shabaab's desire to appeal broadly to militants from outside Somalia. The video features shots of fighters from all over the world appealing to their fellow Muslims in various languages, including English, Swedish and Swahili. Speaking with a heavy British accent, one of the Islamic militants featured in the message, who went by the pseudonym Abu Dujana, made what appeared to be a rallying call to go to Somalia. What most concerns European and U.S. counter-terrorism officials are Shabaab recruits from Britain, the United States or other European countries who return to their countries of birth after training with Islamic militants and then, either on their own or after recruiting small cells of followers, begin to plot attacks. In July 2010, investigators from the Homeland Security committee of the U.S. House of Representatives issued a report which found that more than 40 Americans from Muslim-American communities around the United States had joined Shabaab since 2007, including two dozen from Minneapolis alone. Congressional investigators said that of the 40 U.S. recruits to Shabaab, three returned to the United States and were arrested, one is awaiting extradition to the United States from the Netherlands, and 15 are believed by U.S. authorities to be dead. In a speech in April 2010, Mark Giuliano, a senior counter-terrorism official with the FBI, said that 12 U.S. citizens had been killed in Somalia fighting for Shabaab since 2006. By one estimate, the Congressional report said, at least three of the dead American Shabaab recruits had killed themselves in suicide bomb attacks. But Congressional investigators said that they were particularly alarmed by the fact that "as many as 21 American Shabaab fighters (were) still at large or unaccounted for." Moreover, the Congressional report said, at least 20 Canadians of Somali descent had also disappeared and were believed by Canadian authorities to have joined Shabaab.

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