Al-Qeada influence growing in Nigeria, others – Report

Posted by admin Africa & World Politics, Boko Haram, National Politics, Top Stories Thursday, September 8th, 2011

A detailed analysis by a leading global news agency on Thursday says the influence of the global Islamic terrorist group, al-Qeada, is growing in Nigeria and other countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

Quoting intelligence experts, analysts and diplomats, Reuters reports that there is growing interaction between al-Qeada and Nigeria-based terrorist sect, Boko Haram. Boko Haram is currently engaged in a campaign of attrition against the Federal Government.

The report says emerging trends show that al-Qeada broadening its reach, “possibly by sharing training, tactics and weapons, with other militant groups, after failing to strike in Europe and facing heavy resistance in Algeria.”

“(But) the links between Boko Haram and AQIM are there and probably getting stronger. We are not clear on the degree of cooperation. But if you are training people you are going to be talking about strategy, so there is a degree of coordination,” the report quoted an unnamed diplomat as saying.

Boko Haram claimed responsibility for the June 6 and August 26 bombings of the police headquarters and United Nations building, both in Abuja.

The State Security Service last week declared one Mamman Nur wanted as the mastermind of the UN building bombing.

“Investigation has revealed that one Mamman Nur, a notorious Boko Haram element with al-Qaeda links who returned recently from Somalia masterminded the attack on the United Nations building in Abuja,” spokesperson for the SSS, Marilyn Ogar had said in a statement in Abuja.

Barely 24 hours after the SSS statement, a Boko Haram spokesman revealed that a 27-year-old Nigerian named Mohammed Abul Barra drove the bomb-laden Honda car into the UN building.

Reuters says the United States, United Nations and the European Union have also expressed concern that al Qaeda fighters in the Sahara may be acquiring weapons looted from former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s stocks.

The bombing of the UN office in Abuja is seen as a clear escalation in targets and methods for a group that rejects Western education but previously targeted security forces in the North.

“It also mirrored al- Qaeda’s bombing of U.N. headquarters in Iraq in 2003 and another in Algeria in 2007,” the report says.

“Experts say increasing numbers of Nigerians are training with fighters linked to al-Qaeda in the desert, potentially adding black African recruits to ranks still mostly dominated by Arab faces, and broadening al Qaeda’s regional influence.

“Sharing men and ideas is not new – Islamists from North Africa flooded to Iraq to take part in the insurgency there, with many having since returned back home.

“The Nigerian Islamist sect Boko Haram, which claimed the August 26 Abuja bombing, and al Qaeda’s North African wing AQIM which emerged from Algerian militant groups and now roams across much of the Sahara, appear awkward bedfellows due to traditional tensions between black and Arab Africans.”

Kwesi Aning of the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping and Training Center told Reuters that “the apparent convergence of at least some of the groups’ interests was a significant concern.”

The report, however, says that the lack of open-source proof on collaboration and ethnic differences between the groups makes analysts to remain cautious over any kind of alliance.

“Although AQIM has expanded into sub-Saharan Africa, there remains a level of distrust between black Africans and the group’s Arab leaders,” the U.S.-based Center for Strategic and International Studies said in a report this month.

Peter Sharwood-Smith, Nigeria country manager at risk consultants Drum Cussac, stressed Boko Haram still appeared Nigeria-focused but was open to collaboration.

Aning said that while details and numbers remained sketchy, links between the groups had been growing for several years.

According to Sahara-researcher Jeremy Keenan, a “couple of dozen” Nigerians have trained with AQIM in the Sahara.

Clearly conscious of its Arab-dominated image, AQIM has broadcast videos seeking to show that it had succeeded in luring recruits from south of the Sahara, with one propaganda film last year showing fighters preaching in a number of languages, including Fulani, Hausa and Portuguese.

Improved collaboration between the governments of Mali and Mauritania has led to attacks on AQIM training camps while, after the spate of kidnappings, potential targets are now few and far between.

“(Ties with Boko Haram) give them much more reach. Nigeria has much more juicy targets,” the diplomat quoted in the report said.

“Increased sophistication and operational tempo could depend in part on a few members who have received training and then return to construct explosives and possibly disseminate their knowledge,” AQIM expert Andrew Lebovich wrote on the al-Wasat blog last month.

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