Al Shabaab Money Laundering Results in the Closing of Hawala in the US

Nairobi — Humanitarian groups in Somalia have raised the red flag as foreign banks prepare to pull out of money transfer business as the world seeks to paralyse Al-Shabaab operations.

Franklin Bank -- the last of the US financial institutions in the unregulated money transfer business (hawala) in Somalia -- plans to suspend money wiring services this week, putting at stake millions of dollars remitted from abroad.


Last week, Oxfam Group and the American Refugee Committee said the decision would disrupt aid from family members and well-wishers abroad, affecting 250,000 Somalis in need of urgent life-saving assistance.

"This is the worst time for this service to stop. Any gaps with remittance flows in the middle of the famine could be disastrous," Shannon Scribner, Oxfam America's humanitarian policy manager, said, adding that the $100 million in worth of remittances from US that is received each year in Somalia will be affected.

Franklin took the decision two weeks ago to ditch hawala, an unregulated money transfer service, at the end of this month saying it violates US counterterrorism financing regulations crafted after the September 11, 2001 al-Qaida bombings.

"The US government should give assurances to the bank that there will be no legal ramifications of providing this service to Somalis in need," Ms Scribner said. Under hawala which is widely practised in Islamic countries, a recipient simply claims money from a broker in home city on promise that the sender has deposited similar amount with another hawala broker abroad.

This way, currency worth billions of shillings is exchanged across borders without any documentation as the parties rely on trust embedded in Islamic law to conduct the business.In war-torn Somalia where many residents do not have bank accounts, hawala services have thrived.

In Nairobi, the growing number of hawala merchants in Eastleigh estate is seen as the channel through which billions of shillings sent by Somalis living in the diaspora has found its way into Kenya's real-estate segment.

The Rest @ AllAfrica

Jama Mohamed Miraa Trafficker is a Name That has come up Before

A Nairobi businessman was arrested in Eastleigh and later charged with trying to obtain money by false pretense and altering genuine documents. The man, who also claims to be a pilot at the Wilson Airport and commonly known by his friends as Captain Jama Mohamed, was arrested on Eastleigh's 12 Street on Thursday last week. Police said the man had tried to steal from Barclay's Bank where he presented a forged Bankers Cheque.

• The suspect is said to have entered into a contract with another city businessman, Yassin Mohamed, to transport his miraa from Nairobi to foreign destinations including Netherlands and Somalia. 
• According to statements seen by the Star, the suspect is said to have been given a down payment of Sh3.5 million by the businessman in September while the remaining amount was to be paid later. 
• The total contract amount was Sh17 million. However, police investigating the case said the suspect was arrested after he presented a fake bankers cheque claiming it was drafted by Yassin.

According to the police, he was to link up his client with Kings Air Services who were to execute the transporting business. He appeared before Kiambu Senior Resident Magistrate Dolphine Okundi where he was charged with obtaining cash by false pretense and making altering a genuine chegue to make it appear a genuine and a valid document. He was given a cash bail of Sh5 million and a surety of a similar amount.

The Rest @ All Africa via Nairobi Star

Copyright Nairobi Star. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com).

Somali Khatt Smugglers Bring Underage Girls to Makhalis in Kenya for the Sex Trade

At least 50 girls, aged between ten and 15, are sold every week to tour operators and tourist hotels at Sh60,000 each as sex workers and to star in pornographic movies, a report claims. The report released on Tuesday by the International Peace Institute (IPI) says that the girls are trafficked or smuggled to Nairobi from North Eastern Province and Somalia.

The estimation of the number of girls smuggled per week comes from a non-governmental organisation Womankind Kenya, which is based in Garissa.

• "Vehicles that transport miraa  [also called khat, a narcotic weed chewed widely in Somalia] from Kenya to Somalia return loaded with young girls and women, who end up in brothels in Nairobi or who are shipped to Mombasa and destinations outside Kenya," the report says.
• The report titled Termites at Work: Transitional Organised Crime and State Erosion in Kenya was compiled by IPI executive director Mr Peter Gastrow.
• The report says the girls are taken to massage parlours or beauty shops, where contacts from tour operators and hotels come to select the ones they wish to take as sex workers.
• "Tour operators and hotel workers also operate as traffickers and brokers," the report alleges.
• The report says the trafficked children are then taken to scheduled villas in Mombasa where sex tourism thrives.

"The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has estimated that about 10,000 people are trafficked into Coast Province each year," the report says.

Mombasa is a destination for people trafficked from as far as Uganda, Somalia, Tanzania and Ethiopia.

In Kenya, those who control the networks involved in trafficking of humans or smuggling migrants use supermarkets, foreign exchange bureaus and electronic shops as cover for the human trafficking business, the report says.

• The report claims that most traffickers are Somalis and those who head and control the network are known as makhalis.

Code of silence

• In Nairobi and Garissa, the report claims that some traffickers operate as travel agents for airlines. "They pay taxes for their legitimate businesses to ensure that they do not attract queries from Government authorities," the report says.
• The report claims that a code of silence exists among the makhalis and their agents and contacts. "Only other agents, brokers, corrupt senior police officers, and their lawyers know what they do behind their veneer of law abiding upright citizen," the report claims.
• There are at least five to ten makhalis in northern Kenya and in Eastleigh in Nairobi.

They each control a loosely structured network, which they run independently from each other.
By Athman Amran

The Rest @ Standard Media (Kenya)

Hassan Mahat Omar Designated as Terrorist by OFAC

Hassan Mahat Omar

The Treasury designation also included Hassan Mahat Omar, a previously unknown Shabaab leader who operates from Nairobi, Kenya.

• Omar is described as a "a key figure in al Shabaab's efforts to recruit new members and raise funds"
• "an ideological leader of al Shabaab."
• He also "exercises leadership and decision-making authority in al Shabaab's internal political and operational decisions."
• Omar operates from a mosque in the Eastleigh section of Nairobi, where he serves as "a key leader."
• Omar and other Shabaab leaders use the Eastleigh mosque to "raise funds, recruit and disseminate propaganda on behalf of al Shabaab."

As a religious leader, Omar has used his position to issue fatwas, or edicts, in favor of Shabaab. His fatwas "have provided al-Shabaab with the religious justification to wage jihad against Somalia's Transitional Federal Government."

The Rest @ The Long War Journal

18 Clerics Capture on Way Home From EastLeigh

The pont of the following story is that 18 clerics were riding/hidden in a truck, heading east from Eastleigh enroute to Mombasa when they were arrested, based on a tip. North from Mombasa is the Best rout for returning to South East Somalia. Eastleigh, the place they came to "visit" is Shabaab's logistics base and a prime location for al Shabaab recruits heading into Somalia.

-Shimron Issachar

NAIROBI, Kenya, Jan. 3 (UPI) -- Kenyan authorities say they have arrested 18 Muslim preachers found hidden in a truck.

The preachers, detained Sunday en route from Nairobi to Mombasa, had passports, identity cards and voter cards to prove their Kenyan citizenship, police told the Daily Nation newspaper of Nairobi.

"But our main puzzle is in this age of good and comfortable means of transport why the preachers chose to be transported this way. This is what detectives are trying to establish," said Charles Kerich, police chief in Machakos.

Each had a Koran and other religious literature along with clothing in his bag.
Kerich said police stopped the truck at the Kyumbi station after receiving a tip and found the 18 inside. They were taken to the Machakos station and jailed.

One of the men, calling himself Mr. Mohammed, told the Nation they had come to Nairobi to attend a national gathering of preachers in Eastleigh.

"It is what in Christianity you call a crusade. In the Islamic world we call such gatherings Markaz Baabul," he said.

He said the truck driver offered to drive them to Mombasa for free.

The Rest @ UPI

Shabaab Support Operations in Eastleigh Rounded Up

The following Report suggestes a Shabaab support operation.......That's what it look's lie

......I'm just saying......

-Shimron Issachar

*****************************

By Cyrus Ombati

Thirty-eight illegal immigrants have been arrested in a police swoop. The foreigners who included

• 28 Somalis,
• four Eritreans,
• five Pakistanis
• one Congolese

were arrested from different houses during the operation.

Police said the victims did not have legal documents. Nairobi Area PPO Anthony Kibuchi said they would continue with the operation across the city after it emerged there are many illegal immigrants.

ÒWe have realised there are so many such people here and we urge them to either register with the authorities or face the law,Ó said Mr Kibuchi. They were taken to different police stations, before they appear before court.

Those arrested on Monday night were taken to different police stations for grilling before they could appear before court.

Ethiopians arrested earlier

The arrests came days after 89 Ethiopians were arrested from a stuffy house in Uthiru area for being in the country illegally.

They were all staying in a four-bed roomed house and they took bread and tea daily as their meal.

The Ethiopians have started serving a three-month jail term after failing to raise a fine of Sh10,000 each.

The Ethiopians told Kibera senior magistrate Grace Nzioka they were on transit to South Africa where they had been promised jobs.

The magistrate noted the country was becoming a hub for human trafficking and deterrent measures were needed to check the crime.

Interestingly 39 of those arrested in Uthiru had earlier this year been nabbed in Kajiado area and sentenced to various jail terms for similar offenses but it is not clear how they found their freedom.

Police say most immigrants pass through the porous borders before ending up in Nairobi but fail to register or report to the immigration officials as required by the laws.

Investigations show some of the immigrants are behind a number of crimes where they stay, which is a concern to authorities.

The Rest @ The Standard (Kenya)

Shabaab Recruiting Mercenaries in Grissa

Two hundred kilometres of desert scrubland populated by nomads herding camels and goats lie between Garissa and Kenya’s border with Somalia.

Around the corrugated-iron shelter where women sell milk each morning from yellow plastic drums, conversation focuses on the encroachment of warring militia and the recent victories of al-Shabab, an Islamist group accused of links to al-Qaeda.

Although the Kenyan government has sent troops to guard the border, people in this region fear that the rebel group has already infiltrated Kenya and is recruiting vulnerable youngsters.

As ethnic Somalis, there is nothing to distinguish the insurgents from their Kenyan neighbours.

Hassan Sherie, who runs an organisation helping unemployed youth, believes they have a sophisticated network of operatives with links to some Koranic schools in Garissa.

He does not think their fundamentalist ideology will attract young Kenyans but says they use generous sums of money as bait.

Cash incentive

It was the offer of $600 (£374) a month that persuaded Abdullah (not his real name) to join.

He was in a group of 20 young men recruited in 2008 at a mosque in Garissa.

“We were jobless. That’s what encouraged us to join al-Shabab,” he says.

“We were told we were fighting a holy war, a jihad, and if you kill supporters of the government you will go to heaven.”

He and his friends were taken across the border where Arab trainers taught them how to use AK47s and bazookas.

After two months, they were sent to the southern Somali port of Kismayo and ordered to disarm civilians.

Abdullah says al-Shabab was attacking local Somalis rather than infidels and he was frightened by their brutality.

“They were praying and reading the Koran but doing evil things,” he says.

“I witnessed four men having their hands chopped off and people in captivity were very scared.”

The Rest @ On the Defense

Shabaab and Hizbul Islam Aim at Kenya

MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Somalia's hardline al Shabaab rebels have prepared two suicide bombers disguised as military and police officers who are planning to strike Mogadishu's seaport and airport, the Somali police said on Monday.

A suicide bomber disguised as a woman in a veil blew up a medical graduation ceremony in the capital on Thursday and killed at least 22 people, including three government ministers, several doctors, students and their relatives.

Western security agencies say the failed Horn of Africa state is a safe haven for militants including foreign jihadists who use it to plot attacks across the region and beyond.

"Our intelligence reports say al Shabaab has prepared two suicide bombers in high-ranking police and military uniforms. They are going to target the airport and seaport," police spokesman Abdullahi Hassan Barise told reporters in Mogadishu.

"We have alerted all our forces. They should not be deceived by these al Shabaab suicide bombers."

The United States accuses the insurgent group of being al Qaeda's proxy in the impoverished, drought-ravaged country.

Somalia has lacked a functioning central government since 1991, and the Western-backed administration of President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed controls just a few strategic sites in the capital, including the heavily guarded seaport and international airport.

Fighting has killed at least 19,000 Somali civilians since the start of 2007 and driven 1.5 million from their homes, triggering one of the world's worst humanitarian disasters.

At sea, Somali pirates gangs have made tens of millions of dollars in ransoms.

On Sunday, Ahmed's government fired the head of the country's police force and its military chief in an effort to bolster security following Thursday's bombing.

Neighboring Kenya has arrested more than 300 people in recent days in Eastleigh, a Nairobi suburb that is predominantly populated by the Somali ethnic community, residents said.

"They are categorizing them as al Shabaab members," local councilor Abdifatah Ali told Reuters. "They are searching houses, hotels and businesses without court permission, and this is clearly a violation of our national laws."

Kenyan police could not immediately be reached for comment.

Kenyan security forces are on high alert along their frontier with Somalia after al Shabaab gunmen seized several small towns on the Somali side of the border in recent weeks.

On Monday, nine suspected members of another Somali rebel group, Hizbul Islam, appeared in court in Mombasa charged with illegal firearms possession after they arrested on Thursday with 20 AK-47 rifles close to the A-list resort island of Lamu.

The men were also charged with being in Kenya illegally. A magistrate remanded them to prison until a hearing on January 8.

(Additional reporting by Abdiaziz Hassan in Nairobi and Celestine Achieng in Mombasa; Writing by Daniel Wallis; Editing by Michael Roddy)

The Rest @ AP and Inform.com








Shimron Issachar

Twelve (12 )Etritrian Soccer Players disappear into the Eastliegh Community of Nairobi, Kenya, known to be a frequent Shabaab transhipment for its recruits. It is possible this is simply a group of youths who have been enticed to stay in Kenya for economic reasons, but they may soon find that Shabaab requires a price for hiding them.

-Shimron Issachar

NAIROBI, Dec. 15 (Xinhua) -- The Kenya police said Tuesday 12 Eritrean national soccer players who disappeared after their team was bundled out of the Orange Cecafa Senior Challenge Cup are hiding in Eastleigh, east Nairobi.

The police said they have already launched an elaborate search to track down these players, but it will be a long shot for police to trace down their target in a residential estate full of illegal immigrants especially from Somalia.

Cecafa secretary Nicholas Musonye said he has handed all the names to the police and is not to blame for their disappearance.

The Eritreans were knocked out of the Cecafa competition for East and Central African nations last week. But when the team's plane landed back home, it was reportedly only carrying 10 players, a coach and an official.

However, Eritrea's Ambassador to Kenya Salih Omar said the number was exaggerated for political reasons in a bid to portray Asmara as an unstable place.

"We know who are behind this scam. It is pointless to name them, but I will tell them they will not succeed," Omar told journalists in Nairobi.

The ambassador extended an arm to the players to report to his embassy so he may help them secure the right documents.

"Nobody will force them back home. Maybe they need to taste life outside home to realize home is best. My government is doing everything possible to see that the needed infrastructure is available to support the youths. There is no point running away from home," said the ambassador.

The Eritrean government, according to Omar, will dig to the root cause and tackle the problem.

"Last year, we had another four disappearing. But the numbers are always blown up. They are trooping back home after realizing their mistakes. Those involved take advantage of the adventure and their young mind to confuse them," said Omar.

Musonye, who is helping the police with the search, remained skeptic that most of the players are hiding in the populous Eastleigh Estate.

"I am certain they are hiding in Eastleigh. We have so many Eritreans there. It is unfortunate, and puts Cecafa and Eritrea Football in ambiguous situation," Musonye said. "Eritrean FA did work extra hard to get them take part in the competition, unfortunately these boys had other ideas."

Many Eritreans live in Nairobi and it will be hard for the police to pin point the culprits.

The Rest @ Xinhuanet


Shimron Issachar

This was originally published in the Christian Science Monitor August 26, 2009

The Somali enclave of Eastleigh in Kenya's capital, Nairobi, is now a recruiting and financial center for hardline Islamists fighting in neighboring Somalia.

The streets of Eastleigh, a Somali enclave of Kenya's capital, Nairobi, are crowded and dirty. Sewage and rotting garbage flow through gullies. Police are virtually nonexistent; restaurants are locked, even when open, for safety reasons; and guns are readily available for sale at the market. No one ever said "Little Mogadishu" was paradise, but now the sprawling neighborhood has become a hub of financing and recruiting for militant Islamists waging holy war in neighboring Somalia, according to residents, security analysts, and diplomats.

"Those who kill people in Somalia are also here – scattered all over the place," says an elderly Sufi Muslim sheikh matter-of-factly. "This is the hotspot of the Somali fundamentalism.... They are recruiting right here in Nairobi."

In the latest chapter in a civil war that has raged since 1991, Somalia's radical insurgents this week rejected the Western-backed transitional government's call for a cease-fire during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Militant and moderate Islamists are battling for control of the rubble-strewn streets of Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, fighting that has forced more than 1.4 million people to flee their homes and caused what the United Nations on Wednesday called the country's worst humanitarian crisis in 18 years of war.

But here in Eastleigh, the war takes a different form. Little Mogadishu has become a port through which Somali insurgents raise money and recruit fighters, especially for the militant group, Al Shabab, which has been labeled an Al Qaeda-linked terrorist organization by the US government.

"What we know is that Al Shabab is very popular in Eastleigh," says Roland Marchal, senior research fellow at the Paris-based National Center for Scientific Research. "Al Shabab has been able at different moments to bring a number of people in Eastleigh to fight in Somalia. It's very likely that a number of economic operators in Eastleigh try to collect money and support this organization."

Why young Somali-Kenyans join militants Outside a small green-gated home in Eastleigh, the elderly sheikh – who declined to be named due to the grave threat to anyone talking about Somali militant operations – says agents of Somali insurgents have recruited from across the country dozens of Somali-Kenyans, most in their early 20s, who are missing and presumed dead in Somalia.

Though their parents were moderate, a lack of employment or alternatives led them to become students of madrassas (religious schools), where they adopted more extreme ideologies, he says.

Estimates of the number of recruited Kenyans range from dozens to thousands, most – but not all – Somali-Kenyans. The insurgency benefits from an effective recruitment network that works out of Eastleigh. Diplomats say recruiters use a combination of money and brainwashing to pull in the youths, many of them from refugee camps and areas along the Somali border. "

These young men have no ID papers, no future," says the sheikh. "The only future they see is blowing themselves up and going to heaven." Insurgents in Somalia are increasingly relying on suicide bomb attacks in their offensives.

One woman, the sheikh says, lost her 12-year-old son. She went looking for him in Somalia's southern port town of Kismayo, under insurgent control, and found him training to be a suicide bomber. She returned home emptyhanded. "If she'd tried to bring him, she'd be killed," the sheikh says.

In Somalia, moderate Sufis, belonging to a traditionally peaceful group called Ahl al-Sunna wal Jama'a, have taken up arms to defend their vision of Islam against militant groups, like Al Shabab, that are not only fighting the government, but also desecrating Sufi graves and attacking their more moderate views.

In Kenya, Sufis are also fighting back, but not with guns. Instead, they are trying to keep their children alive through a "counterjihad." "We are trying to teach our children at home. We don't even send them to madrassas.... We don't trust [the madrassas] with our children," says the sheikh.

"If they knew you were writing this, you'd go back without a head."

How money flows through Eastleigh According to a regional analyst who has studied Somalia for nearly two decades but cannot be named because his work is too politically and diplomatically sensitive, up to $3 million passes through Eastleigh to Somalia every year. The money comes from businessmen who support the insurgency, from mosques that fundraise, and from foreign donors who sometimes funnel it through Eastleigh.

Using an informal money transfer system called hawala, Somalis in any part of the world can make money available in Eastleigh within minutes.

From there, it can be carried north to the porous and badly guarded Kenya-Somalia border. The cash funds anything from guns to fuel to uniforms. The transfers are hard to track, Mr. Marchal says, because they are generally small payments that do not attract much attention. But money also gets to Somalia in other ways.

He lays out an example: Sympathizers of insurgents knowingly buy sugar from certain vendors in Kenya. They send that sugar to Somalia, where it is resold. None of these activities are illegal, but "then the money disappears," Marchal says. "It's very efficient.... There is no profit, no fee.

[All the money] goes to the organization. This is untraceable for anybody." No entity in Eastleigh has been under more suspicion than the Sixth Street mosque, a small, unimposing building on top of a FedEx shop, hidden among laundry-cluttered balconies.

The mosque is among Al Shabab's main fundraisers in Eastleigh, according to a Nairobi-based official of the African Union (AU) peacekeeping force in Somalia who spoke anonymously because he is not authorized to talk to the media.

"Sixth Street mosque has a history of supporting militant Islamist causes in Somalia since 1991," says the regional analyst. Its leader, Sheikh Umall, has called the Somali government an "infidel government" and a "puppet of foreign interests," he says. But knowing he is a person of interest to the US, Kenya, the AU, and the UN, Umall has sung a more moderate tune in recent months.

Fighters without borders Unconfirmed numbers gathered by the Institute for Security Studies in Kenya suggest that as many as 1 in every 10 refugees crossing the border from Somalia into Kenya are members of Al Shabab, which has used severe forms of sharia, or Islamic law, such as amputating the hands of thieves and stoning women accused of adultery.

Al Shabab uses Eastleigh to treat its wounded and run madrassas, from which children often disappear, says the AU official. "They have agents who are here, who brainwash these kids, who end up going there [to Somalia to fight]," he says. "It has become problematic." The AU and UN say Somali-Kenyan recruits are joined by others from Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, even the United States and Europe – many of whom enter Somalia through Nairobi, according to analysts.

Until recently, you could get a fake Somali passport in Eastleigh's Garisa Lodge mall in minutes.

Government plays down Eastleigh concerns

In June, the Kenyan newspaper Daily Nation reported that a Kenyan named Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan leads a group of 180 foreigners in Somalia, called al-Muhajirun, fighting alongside the Somali insurgents and connected to the global terrorist group Al Qaeda.

But the Kenyan government denies there is much of a problem. "We don't believe Kenyans have gone to Somalia or have been recruited to go to Somalia," says Alfred Mutua, the Kenyan government spokesman. "We received reports of attempted recruitment, [but] ... because of our security apparatus, we've made it impossible for them."

In late 2006, when Ethiopian troops invaded Somalia to overthrow Islamists who had taken over, Kenya took precautionary measures, he says. It closed its border with Somalia, allowing only aid workers to enter Somalia from Kenya. The border is heavily patrolled by police, military, and helicopters 24 hours a day, and the government is using satellite technology to monitor vehicles crossing it, says Mr. Mutua. Reports of recruitment are "mere speculation," he adds, as Kenya has used "very high intelligence" to infiltrate the Somali community and disband any recruiting circles.

Kenyan police spokesman Erick Kirathe says Eastleigh is under high surveillance – both overt and covert – because it is a poorer, more-crowded neighborhood where crime is more likely. "It is much better policed than is apparent," he says. "Even visibly, there is much more police presence than in other areas." Because the attention it has received makes it unappealing to terrorists, he argues, Eastleigh is not as threatening as people think.

Mr. Kirathe says no one has been arrested for supporting the Somali insurgency, and "we really don't consider Eastleigh a major risk as of yet." "It's a point of concern," Mutua adds, "but we feel that we've got the situation under control."

Others beg to differ Some observers strongly disagree. They say recruitment in Kenya is longstanding and widespread. "We all know it's happening," one diplomat in Nairobi says, adding that the Kenyan government is unable or unwilling to stop it. The border may be officially closed, but even Mutua admits people are able to sneak through. But sources say the Kenyan government is beginning to take the threat more seriously. "They are panicking," the diplomat says. "They were not doing their best. Now the threat to Kenya is higher than ever. They have to do something." It seems the government is starting to feel that way, too. But it remains divided. Prime Minister Raila Odinga and Foreign Minister Moses Wetangula have called for sending in troops, as Ethiopia had done, to defend the Somali government. "It will be most inappropriate and inadvisable to do nothing when our national security and regional stability is threatened," Mr. Wetangula said recently.

Authorities fear a backlash But with hundreds of thousands of Somalis living in Kenya, strong involvement by the government and any taking of sides could expose Kenya to a big risk.

Insurgents have already threatened to retaliate within Kenya if attacked. "There's a reluctance to really mess with the Somalis," the regional analyst says. The fear is not only on the political level. Insurgents are perceived to have such a presence in Kenya that even average citizens are wary of providing authorities with information on their operations.

In Nairobi, activists who speak out against Somali extremists are threatened. "Because I'm not one of them, then I'm on the other side," says a Somali civil society activist who goes by the name Madobe. He calls the Somali Islamist movement a "cancer spreading very fast," and the insurgents "sub-human." He believes they are tapping his phone and e-mail. "Anytime, I expect a very big knife in my back."

Source The Christian Schince Monitor, by way of Horufahdi.com

Shabaab Recruiting Part 1

This article from the nation ( Kenya ) is two months old, but it illustrates an emerging trend. al Shabaab Recuriters recurintg in the same way al Qaeda recruiters haven been recruiting foreighn fighters for them for some time.

-Shimron Issachar

Kenyan anti-terrorism officials are analysing information about the alleged recruitment of local youth to fight alongside the al-Shabaab militia in war-ravaged Somalia.
Related Stories

A few of them were traced to the village of Liboi, 150 km east of Garissa in northeastern Kenya, on their way to the missions into which they had been secretly recruited by al-Shabaab.
The youth, who are smuggled into Somalia, do not talk about their parents, who may never see them again, or the homes they have left behind forever.

Instead they repeat, as if by rote, the lessons drummed into their heads by al-Shabaab radicals. They talk about the “triumphs” of al-Shabaab, and they talk about the coming battles as al-Shabaab prepares to expand its activities into the Horn of Africa region.

Al-Shabaab is the most virulent of the militant groups destroying Somalia and threatening regional security.

One of the Kenyan ethnic Somali recruits said that at first he did not want to go with the al-Shabaab recruiters, but they forced him. Over time, the trainers persuaded him to join the jihad, or holy war.

Other forced recruits were not so taken in by the militant propaganda, and they dropped out as soon as they could do so safely to return to their previous lives. One of those who left al-Shabaab said he is “steering away from trouble”.

He said he was recruited in Nairobi’s Eastleigh Estate but then discovered the recruiter was lying about the benefits.

“He had promised 15 of us money, but he gave us barely half the amount and vanished the moment we landed in Somalia,” the ex-recruit told investigators.

• Kenyan ethnic Somali parents have long blamed Islamist radicals for the disappearance of their sons.
• Some of the extremist recruiting went on in the schools where the young men were supposed to be educated for a peaceful productive life.
• In October last year, residents of Nairobi’s Pumwani Estate attacked teachers at a madrassa, accusing them of being part of a human trafficking ring that stole their sons.
  The parents said many of their children who attended the madrassa had been smuggled out of Kenya to be trained as terrorists.

Hassan Dahir Aweys flew on Capital Arilines Plane from Kenya

Farah Transport chartered a plane with Capital Airlines to Fly Hassan Dahir Aweys and Six others from Eritria to Mogadishu on 22 April, 2009.


Somalia Islamist Military Offensive

• It looks like Turki and his group is running the Logistics, and has brought at least one resuplly of fresh foreigh troops an supplies up from the south.
• There is a Sheikh Umal legedly raising Funds for Shabaab out of an Eastleigh, Kenya Hotel. The operation in Eastleigh is part of a network that extends to Europe and provides ready cash for radical fighters in Mogadishu.

but that is for another post...

See the article below..

-Shimron Issachar

Nairobi - Kenya has been sucked into the Somali conflict after a key radical on the US terror watch-list used a Nairobi-based airline to fly to Mogadishu from Eritrea.

The Somali government has written a protest note to Nairobi after Sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweys flew on a plane owned by Capital Airlines, which is based at Wilson Airport.

Sheikh Aweys and six other Somali nationals took the flight on April 22, 2009, and now the government in Mogadishu is accusing Kenya of aiding one of the men on the US list of wanted terrorists, who is also accused of links to Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda network.

• Sheikh Aweys’ Hizb-al-Islam together with fighters from the Al-Shabaab movement threaten to take over the capital, Mogadishu.
• “It is true that the said Kenyan aircraft flew Sheikh Aweys into Mogadishu and the Somali government has written to Kenya through the Foreign Affairs ministry to complain about it,” a source privy to the letter but who sought anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter said.
• The United Nations has placed Sheikh Aweys on a list of people “belonging to or associated with” al Qaeda while Washington has ruled out contact with Sheikh Aweys, who denies links to al Qaeda.
• Fighters from Hizb-al-Islam and Al-Shabaab are reported to be within 50 kilometres of the Somali capital.
• Sheikh Aweys has in the past called for the unification of all Somali-inhabited lands, including Kenya’s North Eastern Province, into a Greater Somalia.
• In the 1990s, Sheikh Aweys headed al-Itihaad al-Islamiya, an Islamist group that was responsible for terrorist attacks on hotels and markets in Addis Ababa and was originally funded by bin Laden and was linked to the 1998 United States embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania.
• On November 7, 2001, Sheikh Aweys was named a “supporter of terrorism” and is also on the terrorist list of the United States.
• The fall of the Transitional Government in Mogadishu would see the return of an extremist Islamist administration in Somalia led by figures accused of being close to global terrorist networks.
• Sheikh Aweys was the leader of the Islamic Courts Union that ruled Somalia briefly in 2006 and 2007 before it was dislodged by Ethiopian forces supporting the Transitional government.
• The Ethiopian forces withdrew after the arrival of a token African Union force in Mogadishu, but since then renewed fighting that threatens to topple the government of President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed has sent jitters in the region.

Kenya and Ethiopia are particularly concerned by the deteriorating situation and the rebound of radical Islamist forces.

• According to documents seen by the Nation, the flight from Eritrea to Mogadishu cost Sheikh Aweys and his compatriots $25,000 and was paid for by a firm known as Farah Transport.The names of th(Sh1.9 million) e pilots in charge of the flight are given in the manifest as Mr S. Khan and R. Parmar.

The other passengers on the flight are named as:

• Osman A. Hassan
• Aden W. Diriye
• Ali O. Mohamed
• Kheyre A. Ali
• Mohamed S. Ali
• Idris J. Abdi

When the Nation called Capital Airlines offices at Wilson airport, a woman who identified herself only as Jackie declined to comment and instead referred us to the operations manager.

The manager said he was not aware of the Asmara-Mogadishu flight.“I am not aware of such a flight but we will call you back in 10 minutes. Our MD is not in at the moment,” the manager said. They did not, however, call back.

• Captain Khan and flight officer Parmar were said to have been out of the office.
• The flight was allegedly booked in Nairobi by an unidentified man who claimed to work for Farah Transport.
• On Wednesday, a Kenya Ministry of Foreign Affairs official in the Horn of Africa Division, who could not be quoted because he is not authorised to talk to journalists, confirmed the receipt of the complaint letter from the UN backed Somalia government and said appropriate action would be taken.
• Ethiopia was on Wednesday hosting an Igad meeting that was also attended by Kenya’s Foreign minister Moses Wetang’ula.

Should Al-Shabaab and Hizb-al-Islam take the Somali capital, African Union’s peace-keeping operation, Amisom, would have to evacuate its 4,300 soldiers.

The token force of mostly Uganda soldiers has been frequently targeted by radical fighters.The force is commanded by Ugandan Major-General Francis Okello who has finalised evacuation plans, but the AU’s special representative for Somalia Nicholas Bwakira says the troops will remain in Mogadishu as long as they have the backing of the Transitional government.

He said at a press conference:“Our mandate is given by the international community. We are in Somalia at the invitation of the government. We intend to continue our work despite the position of Al-Shabaab.”

Already, reports from Mogadishu say that there are 250 foreign fighters who are leading the attack on the capital.

• The fighters are from Pakistan, Afghanistan and other Arab countries.
• Meanwhile, security sources in Nairobi suspect that there is stepped up fund-raising by Somali radical groups in Nairobi believed to operate from a hotel in Eastleigh.
• One top fundraiser is known as Sheikh Umal. The operation in Eastleigh is part of a network that extends to Europe and provides ready cash for radical fighters in Mogadishu.

The Rest @ Inside Somalia.org

Kenyan Newspaper The Nation Uncovers Pirate Money Laundering

April 2nd, 2009

Millions of dollars obtained through piracy in the Indian Ocean off Somalia are ending up in Kenya and other parts of the world through a complex money laundering scheme, investigations have revealed.


(four Somali Pirates in Kenyan Court, photo from the Nation)

Since the beginning of the year, at least 40 ships have been hijacked by Somali pirates who have received an estimated $30 million (Sh2.4 billion) in ransom payments. Most of these attacks occur in the Gulf of Aden, but the pirates have been widening their range of operations to include waters off Kenya.

International security agencies are now citing Kenya as a hub for piracy-related money laundering activities.

Piracy incidents

• A report by the US State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs says Kenya’s financial system may be laundering more than $100 million (Sh7.8 billion) each year due to the government’s failure to develop an effective anti-money laundering (AML) regime.
  

“Kenya lacks the institutional capacity, investigative skill and equipment to conduct complex investigations independently. There have been no arrests or prosecutions for money laundering or terrorist financing,” the report says.

It adds that even for the existing regulations, there is little enforcement.

• It cites the cross-border currency controls that require any amount of cash above $5,000 (Sh393,000) to be disclosed at the point of entry or exit for record-keeping purposes, but says this provision is rarely enforced, and authorities keep no record of cash smuggling attempts.


• Recent investigations in which a local bank was linked to laundering of tax evasion proceeds illustrate Kenya’s vulnerability to money laundering, the report adds. “This case illustrates that criminals have been taking advantage of Kenya’s inadequate AML regime for years by evading oversight and/or by reportedly paying off enforcement officials, other government officials and politicians.”
  


• It also says that Kenya has not criminalised the financing of terrorism as required by the United Nations, adding that with the exception of intercepted drugs and narcotics, seizures of assets are rare.
  

Money transfer

• Investigators also raised the alarm about hawala, an informal money transfer system known by its Arabic name, that is facilitating money laundering.


• Players in the maritime industry say this elaborate money transfer system is not only thriving in major urban areas in Kenya, but in numerous African countries, the Arab region, Europe, America and Canada as well where millions of dollars are exchanged without any documentation.

Investigations by the Sunday Nation have unearthed a money laundering network being run in backstreet dens in

• Mombasa’s Old Town


• Nairobi’s Eastleigh neighbourhood


• Kampala


• Juba


• Khartoum


• Dar-es-Salaam


• and other major towns in the region.
  

“Many people have opted for the hawala money transfer system as it is cheap and cost-effective, unlike going to the bank to process letters of credit or telegraphic transfers,” a trader conversant with the system told the Sunday Nation.

He said all one had to do was go to a hawala broker, deposit the money for a small fee, then the recipient is alerted by phone or e-mail where to collect the money. Charges vary from Sh1,000 to transfer Sh100,000 within East Africa to Sh2,000 to transfer Sh260,000 to Dubai. Recognised financial institutions charge as much as Sh10,000 to transfer the same amounts.

Investigators say this system of money transfer not only abets piracy but also hampers investigations by countries tracking proceeds from drug-trafficking, arms-smuggling and terrorism activities.

Somali MP Awad Ahmed Ashareh denied reports that proceeds from piracy were being laundered in Kenya, saying investigations indicated that none of the Somalis who had invested in the country had links with pirates.

Another MP, who sought anonymity, named Puntland in Somalia, Djibouti and unidentified Western countries as among those benefitting from piracy.

“These pirates are well-connected and some work with mafias and other international criminals who supply them with arms through countries like Yemen,” the MP, who was in Nairobi for a recent Igad meeting, said.

The pirates, he said, were organised into three groups:

• those with military tactics who launch the first attack;


• educated ones with technological know-how who use satellite phones and computers to communicate with owners of the ships and demand ransoms;


• and those who collect the ransom.

Former fishermen who understand the waters help them navigate routes.

Lucrative business

Mr Ashareh said piracy erupted in Somalia in the 1990s when Somalis organised themselves to fight fishermen from Western countries who were fishing in Somali waters.

Once they had this under control, some of the Somalis resorted to hijacking ships and found it to be lucrative. Now, maritime experts warn that for as long as ship owners continue to pay the huge ransoms demanded, piracy will continue to thrive.

Mr Ashareh called on the international community to help the troubled country establish governing institutions to curb piracy, saying the Somali Transitional Federal Government urgently needed help to establish court systems, and police and coastal guards.

The Rest @ The Nation (Kenya)

Somali Pirates Launder Ransome Money Using Kenya Hawala

Millions of dollars obtained through piracy in the Indian Ocean off Somalia are ending up in Kenya and other parts of the world through a complex money laundering scheme, investigations have revealed.

Since the beginning of the year, at least 40 ships have been hijacked by Somali pirates who have received an estimated $30 million (Sh2.4 billion) in ransom payments. Most of these attacks occur in the Gulf of Aden, but the pirates have been widening their range of operations to include waters off Kenya.

International security agencies are now citing Kenya as a hub for piracy-related money laundering activities.

Piracy incidents

A report by the US State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs says Kenya’s financial system may be laundering more than $100 million (Sh7.8 billion) each year due to the government’s failure to develop an effective anti-money laundering (AML) regime.

• “Kenya lacks the institutional capacity, investigative skill and equipment to conduct complex investigations independently.
• There have been no arrests or prosecutions for money laundering or terrorist financing,” the report says.
• It adds that even for the existing regulations, there is little enforcement. It cites the cross-border currency controls that require any amount of cash above $5,000 (Sh393,000) to be disclosed at the point of entry or exit for record-keeping purposes, but says this provision is rarely enforced, and authorities keep no record of cash smuggling attempts.
  

Recent investigations in which a local bank was linked to laundering of tax evasion proceeds illustrate Kenya’s vulnerability to money laundering, the report adds. “This case illustrates that criminals have been taking advantage of Kenya’s inadequate AML regime for years by evading oversight and/or by reportedly paying off enforcement officials, other government officials and politicians.”

It also says that Kenya has not criminalised the financing of terrorism as required by the United Nations, adding that with the exception of intercepted drugs and narcotics, seizures of assets are rare.

Money transfer

Investigators also raised the alarm about hawala, an informal money transfer system known by its Arabic name, that is facilitating money laundering.

• Players in the maritime industry say this elaborate money transfer system is not only thriving in major urban areas in Kenya, but in numerous African countries, the Arab region, Europe, America and Canada as well where millions of dollars are exchanged without any documentation.
  

Investigations by the Sunday Nation have unearthed a money laundering network being run in backstreet dens in:

• Mombasa’s Old Town
• Nairobi’s Eastleigh neighbourhood
• Kampala
• Juba
• Khartoum
• Dar-es-Salaam
• other major towns in the region.
  

"Many people have opted for the hawala money transfer system as it is cheap and cost-effective, unlike going to the bank to process letters of credit or telegraphic transfers,” a trader conversant with the system told the Sunday Nation.

He said all one had to do was go to a hawala broker, deposit the money for a small fee, then the recipient is alerted by phone or e-mail where to collect the money.

• Charges vary from Sh1,000 to transfer Sh100,000 within East Africa to Sh2,000 to transfer Sh260,000 to Dubai. Recognised financial institutions charge as much as Sh10,000 to transfer the same amounts.
  
• Investigators say this system of money transfer not only abets piracy but also hampers investigations by countries tracking proceeds from drug-trafficking, arms-smuggling and terrorism activities.

The Rest @ The Sunday Nation (Kenya)