5 Al-Shabaab suspects nabbed with explosives in Somalia

Somalia's security forces have arrested five Al-Shabaab suspects and seized a vehicle laden with explosives in the northern port town of Bosasso, officials said on Wednesday.

Police Commissioner of Bari region, Abdihakim Hussein Yusuf said the security forces received a tip off from members of the public and swung into action to thwart a terrorist attack in the town.

"We have captured five Al-Shabaab suspects and a vehicle loaded with explosives after receiving prior intelligence. Investigation is still continuing now," Yusuf said.

He said the suspects who were arrested on Tuesday night have been planning to carry terror attacks on unspecified locations in Puntland including public places.

Hussein said the security forces have enhanced operations to identify the group's targets, saying this was a significant operation against the terror cells in the region.

The latest arrest comes after Al-Shabaab and pro-Islamic States' militants killed nine Puntland soldiers in a roadside blast.

rahm warsame

US strikes kill more than 100 AlShabaab Islamic terrorists

US aircraft attacked southern Somalia, killing more than 100 Al-Shabaab militants, including 20 commanders, residents and officials have said according to nation.co.ke.

Witnesses said the planes targeted the militants’ hideouts in Wargaduud and El-Adde where many Kenyan soldiers were killed by the terrorists in January 2016.

Among senior Shabaab commanders killed in the dawn attack that also destroyed two Vehicles Bound Explosive Devices at Wargaduud were Abdirahman Fillow and Abdirahman Ben Dutie. Dutie was from Marehanrer Dalal section.

“In Wargaduud and El-Adde, US airstrikes killed 20 Al-Shabaab commanders, among them Abdirahman Fillow and about 85 militants,” said a security official who declined to be named.

SIEGE CONTINUES

“The strike happened at 2am and the siege continues.”

Residents in El-Adde reported hearing explosions just after midnight on Friday.

“There was heavy bombing on an Al-Shabaab base near El-Adde Town but we don’t know the number of casualties. We heard sounds of jets and then explosions,” a resident said.

The bombardment came after US military officials said soldiers had been deployed to Somalia to train and equip the national and African Union forces fighting the terrorists.

The team is carrying out a train-and-equip mission that is expected to last through the end of September, according to American officials.

SPECIAL OPERATIONS

The US soldiers will join the small number of special operations forces already in Somalia providing counterterrorism support to local forces.

America maintains a small unit of about 50 troops in the country, mainly to advise and assist Somalia and Amison soldiers. When called in, their helicopters, drones and manned aircraft are available for quick response.

President Donald Trump in March granted additional powers to US Africa Command to conduct counterterrorism strikes against the terrorists.

HIGH ALERT

The bombing came just hours after Kenyan security agencies were put on high alert following reports that nine Kenyans who had joined Al-Shabaab in Somalia could be headed back to the country to launch attacks.

The alert said the terrorists were returning home following sustained attacks by Kenya Defence Forces troops who are part of Amisom.

Police asked Kenyans to be on the alert and report any suspicious people. The attacks were to be carried out during the Easter weekend, according to the police report.

In the last one month, Kenyan troops say they have killed at least 90 Al-Shabaab terrorists in Somalia, “which has weakened the group’s capability to launch attacks”.

Can there be a country with a worthless currency? The country of counterfeit notes

Can there be a country with a worthless currency? The history of Somalia is marked by it. But behind this monetary disorganization is a region punished by a fierce famine and an infinite civil war.

To this day, Somalia is enduring the worst drought of the last two decades. So serious is the situation that they estimate a balance of mortality even greater than that of 6 years ago, where the famine killed approximately 260,000 people.

Cash bags with money and hunger

The African country could be an imaginary world in a dramatic novel, but it is the reality of a hostile world. "Somali pirates with machine guns," a friend tells me when I name the region. But it is also  the place of fake bills. 

In Mogadishu, its capital, the buildings are skeletons: they have the chariots dressed in concrete and with huge holes that reveal that there is nothing inside. The civil war devastated the place. Through these streets, however, there are men and women who walk with bags full of money.

The Central Bank has not issued a single ticket for 25 years. Mogadishu circulates false and worthless silver. The papers emanate scent and break easily, disintegrate between the fingers. There, one dollar is 22,000 Somali shillings. Citizens, overwhelmed by hunger and burned by drought, change innumerable amounts of worthless bills for some bread.

Perpetual agony

Until 1991, Somali best president strongman Siad Barré presided over the country. When it was overthrown, the Somali institutions ceased to function. The country became institutionally sterile. From the decade of the 90 until today, several regions declared themselves autonomous.

The clans, who fought the territory with fierce civil wars, also took power. The power of the state, as Marxist theory would call it, was nobody's. That state does not exist. To this day, they call it failed.

Somalia is also the place of "warlords" and groups of Western mercenaries. The platform for chaos is propitious. Within this reality also the ethnic differences coexist. The inhabitants of Mogadishu live the second of their life in a limbo. There is nothing inhumane in the Somali context, everything comes from the humanism of man.

The country of counterfeit notes is also that of malnutrition, death, war, poverty, pirates and drought. In Somalia the agony is perpetual because it can not stop its escalation of decay, but also because nobody wants. If the world has erred its way, this is one of its results

NEW Minister of Finance: Abdirahman Bayle was swearing in office today. 

Abdirahman y warsame (Rahm)

You can always follow me  @terrorfreesomal