TRIPOLI/MOGADISHU: US raids in
Libya and Somalia that captured
an Islamist wanted for bombing its Nairobi embassy 15 years ago show
Washington's determination to hunt down
al-Qaida leaders around the globe, secretary of state
John Kerry said on Sunday.
Libyan Nazih al-Ragye, better known by the cover name Abu Anas al-Liby, was seized by US forces in Tripoli on Saturday,
the Pentagon said. A seaborne raid on the Somali port of Barawe, a stronghold of the
al-Shabaab movement behind last month's attack on a Kenyan mall, failed to take or kill its target.
"We hope this makes clear that the United States of America will never
stop in its effort to hold those accountable who conduct acts of
terror," Kerry said during a visit to Bali.
"Those members of
al-Qaida and other terrorist organizations literally can run but they
can't hide," Kerry said. "We will continue to try to bring people to
justice."
The twin raids, two years after a US Navy
SEAL team killed al-Qaida founder
Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, demonstrated American reach at a time when Islamist militants have been expanding their presence in
Africa - not least in
Libya following the Western-backed overthrow of Gaddafi.
Libya's government, wary of an Islamist backlash, demanded an explanation for the "kidnapping" of one of its citizens.
The target of the Somali operation was unclear but
a US official
was quoted as saying it was planned in response to the Nairobi mall
attack two weeks ago in which at least 67 were killed. That highlighted
the risk of Somalia's rumbling civil conflict destabilizing a
resource-rich continent where Islamists have been on the rise from west
to east in recent years.
Launched in the early hours of
Saturday, the Somali raid appears to have featured a beach landing in
hostile territory that was followed by an extended firefight. US
officials said SEALs conducted the raid and had killed al-Qaida-allied
al-Shabaab fighters while taking no casualties themselves. Somali police
said seven people were killed during the operation.
Somalia's
Western-backed government, still trying to establish its authority after
two decades of civil war, holds little sway in Barawe, 110 miles south
of Mogadishu.
Asked of his involvement in the US operation, Prime Minister
Abdi Farah Shirdon said: "We have collaboration with the world and with neighboring countries in the battle against al-Shabaab."
LIBYA RAID
In Tripoli, the seemingly bloodless operation to snatch Liby as he
returned home from dawn prayers at a mosque in the capital may have
involved some cooperation with the friendly but weak Libyan
administration - though the government, facing anger from Islamist
militias, issued a public denial.
"The Libyan government is
following the news of the kidnapping of a Libyan citizen who is wanted
by US authorities," read a statement from
the office of Prime Minister Ali Zeidan. "The Libyan government has contacted US authorities to ask them to provide an explanation."
Liby, who the FBI says is 49, has been under US indictment since 2000
for his alleged role in bombing the US embassies in Kenya and
Tanzania
in 1998, which killed 224 people. Of more pressing concern for
Washington, however, may have been that al-Qaida appears to be
establishing itself in Libya today.
With President
Barack Obama wrestling with the legal and political difficulties posed by trying al-Qaida suspects held at the US base at
Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, Liby may be more likely to face trial in New York, where the indictment was filed.
Liby, who had once been granted political asylum from Gaddafi in
Britain, was charged with 20 other people including bin Laden and
current al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri. The
US government offered a $5 million reward for helping capture Liby.
Charges relating to him personally accuse him of discussing the bombing
of the Nairobi embassy in retaliation for the US intervention in the
Somali civil war in 1992-93 and of helping reconnoiter and plan the
attack in the years before 1998.
"As the result of a US counterterrorism operation,
Abu Anas al-Liby is currently lawfully detained by the US military in a secure location outside of Libya," Pentagon spokesman
George Little said without elaborating.
US naval forces in the Mediterranean, as well as bases in Italy and
Germany, would provide ample facilities within a short flight time from
the coastal city to mount an arrest operation.
Neighbors and
Libyan Islamist militia sources said the capture of Liby appeared to go
smoothly: "As I was opening my house door, I saw a group of cars coming
quickly from the direction of the house where al-Ragye lives. I was
shocked by this movement in the early morning," said one neighbor in the
residential district in southern Tripoli.
"They kidnapped him. We do not know who they are."
Abdul Bassit Haroun, a former Islamist militia commander who works with
the Libyan government on security, said the US raid would show Libya
was no refuge for "international terrorists".
"But it is also
very bad that no state institutions had the slightest information about
this process, nor do they have a force which was able to capture him,"
he told Reuters.
"This means the Libyan state simply does not exist."
He warned that Islamist militants, like those blamed for the fatal attack on the U.S. consulate in
Benghazi a year ago, would hit back violently: "This won't just pass," Haroun said.
"There will be a strong reaction in order to take revenge because this is one of the most important al-Qaida figures."
Since Gaddafi was overthrown in 2011 in an uprising backed by
Washington and its allies, well armed warlords have contested control of
the thinly populated desert state and its vast oil resources. Fighters -
and weapons - from Libya played a part in an Islamist revolt in Mali
last year and in the related al-Qaida assault on a gas plant in the
Algerian desert in January.
SOMALIA RAID
The Pentagon confirmed US military personnel had been involved in an
operation against what it called "a known al Shabaab terrorist," in
Somalia, but gave no more details.
Local people in Barawe and Somali security officials said troops came ashore from the
Indian Ocean to attack a house near the shore used by al-Shabaab fighters.
One US official, speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity, said
the al-Shabaab leader targeted in the operation was neither captured nor
killed.
US officials said troops, to avoid civilian
casualties, disengaged after inflicting casualties on al-Shabaab. They
said no US personnel were wounded or killed in the operation, which one
US source said was carried out by a Navy SEAL team.
A Somali
intelligence official said the target of the raid at Barawe, about 110
miles south of Mogadishu, was a Chechen commander, who had been wounded
and his guard killed.
Shabaab spokesman Sheikh Abdiasis Abu
Musab told Reuters that foreign forces had landed on the beach and
launched an assault at dawn that drew gunfire from rebel fighters in one
of the militia's coastal bases.
Britain and Turkey denied his suggestion that their forces had been involved in the attack and taken casualties.
The New York Times quoted an unnamed US security official as saying
that the Barawe raid was planned a week and a half ago in response to
the al-Shabaab assault in neighboring Kenya: "It was prompted by the
Westgate attack,: the official said.
Barawe residents said fighting erupted at about 3am on Saturday (midnight GMT).
"We were awoken by heavy gunfire last night, we thought an al Shabaab
base at the beach was captured," Sumira Nur told Reuters from Barawe by
telephone. "We also heard sounds of shells, but we do not know where
they landed," she added.
