US Terrorism Report Shows Close Ties with Kenya to Combat al-Qaida

The State Department's annual report on global terrorism highlights growing U.S. security ties with its east African ally, Kenya, to meet challenges posed by al-Qaida and al-Qaida supported militants in neighboring Somalia. One key effort is focused on keeping terrorists from being able to smuggle in materials to make a "dirty bomb."The State Department report, released Thursday, contains an overview of the expanding security ties between the United States and Kenya, aimed at preventing terrorists from staging attacks inside Kenya and apprehending suspected terrorists. In the past year, the United States says it helped the Kenyan army develop a Ranger Strike Force, an elite counter-terrorism unit capable of conducting operations against infiltrators and armed groups. The United States also gave training and unspecified equipment to the Kenyan navy for maritime interdiction operations in Kenyan waters.The State Department's Antiterrorism Assistance program also provided training and equipment to the country's Maritime Police Unit. The report says the U.S. military's Djibouti-based Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa is currently installing a Maritime Security and Safety Information System in key positions along the Kenyan coast.

The measures are largely in response to threats posed by two al-Qaida operatives, who allegedly carried out the 1998 attacks on U.S. Embassies in Nairobi and in Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania. U.S. intelligence analysts say the operatives, Comoros-born Fazul Abdullah Mohammed and Kenyan national Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, have eluded capture through the help of al-Qaida's support network in the coastal region of Kenya and in parts of the capital, Nairobi.The rising power of a militant group called al-Shabab in neighboring Somalia has also added a new security challenge in the region. Al-Shabab, which currently controls key towns in southern and central Somalia, was founded several years ago by al-Qaida-trained Somali radicals and is virulently anti-West.,,more..http://www.voanews.com/english/2009-05-01-voa44.cfm