Ahmed Abdi Godane: the al-Shabaab leader targeted by air strikes

[flamingdem]

Source: Telegraph

With his background in accountancy and enthusiasm for poetry, Sheikh Ahmed Abdi Godane is an unlikely candidate to be Africa’s most feared militant leader.

But with the Nairobi shopping mall atrocity in September 2013, the bookish 37-year-old leader of Somalia’s al-Shabaab Islamist movement has achieved a long-running ambition to join the very top tier of global terrorism.
On Tuesday a senior Somali intelligence official said a US drone targeted Godane as he left a meeting of the group's top leaders. The Somali official said intelligence indicated Godane "might have been killed along with other militants." The official said the attack took place in a forest near Sablale district, 105 miles south of Mogadishu, where al-Shabab trains its fighters.

If the reports of his death proved to be true, it would be a bitter blow for the Somali terrorists, for whom Godane has been their long-term leader.

His name, however, rose to worldwide prominence with the Kenyan attacks

Read more: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/somalia/11069471/Ahmed-Abdi-Godane-the-al-Shabaab-leader-targeted-by-air-strikes.html

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Elsewhere reading that he was killed along with an assistant.

[seveneyes]

1. Wonder why they did not also take out the entire meeting location?

When you have that many murderers in one group, why not take advantage of it?

[flamingdem]

2. They might not know yet? This is what NBC sources say confirming the leader's death

Charles Lister @Charles_Lister · 5h
Sources to @NBCNews say #Shabab leader Mokhtar Ali Zubayr (Ahmed Abdi Godane) was killed in US operation in Hawai, Lower Shabelle, #Somalia.