More than 80 members of the jihadist group Al Shabab died between Tuesday and Wednesday in several anti-terrorist army operations in Somalia, reported the Ministry of Information of this Horn of Africa country. In a statement issued late on Wednesday, the Ministry of Information specified that the offensives against the jihadists took place in the regions of Mudug (central-north), Bakool (southwest) and Media Shabelle (south).
In a first mission, about 40 members of Al Shabab were killed in a joint operation by the Somali Army and local residents in the Farah Adan area of ??Mudug, where the terrorists “were gathering and wanted to attack the town of Harardhere.”
The second operation was settled with 35 terrorists killed in an Army operation together with “international allies” (a reference to air attacks by partners such as the United States or Turkey) that took place in the Fiqaay forest, in Media Shabelle. In a third mission, six Al Shabab members were killed and three others wounded in an operation targeting a jihadist settlement in Bakool’s Wajid district.
“The Federal Government of Somalia, in cooperation with the Somali people, is determined to eliminate” Al Shabab, added the statement on the anti-terrorist operations, the result of which EFE could not independently verify.
Somalia has stepped up military operations against the group since Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud announced a “total war” against the jihadists in August 2022. Since then, the Army, supported by the African Union Transition Mission in Somalia (ATMIS), has carried out offensives against the group, sometimes with the military collaboration of the United States and Turkey in aerial bombardments.
Al Shabab, affiliated with the Al Qaeda network since 2012, carries out frequent attacks in the capital, Mogadishu, and other parts of the country to overthrow the central government – backed by the international community – and establish a Wahhabi (ultra-conservative) Islamic State. . The group controls rural areas of central and southern Somalia and also attacks neighboring countries such as Kenya and Ethiopia.
Somalia has been in a state of conflict and chaos since 1991, when dictator Mohamed Siad Barre was overthrown, leaving the country without an effective government and in the hands of Islamist militias and warlords.
