US drone strike targets al-Shabab leader
February 4, 2015
The Pentagon said on Tuesday that US drone aircraft launched a strike in southern Somalia against a senior al-Shabab figure over the weekend.
The strike targeted Yusuf Dheeq, the group's external operations chief, said Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby.
"I'm not in a position now to confirm the results of the strike, but if successful, if he no longer breathes, then this is ... another significant blow to al-Shabab," Kirby said, adding that Dheeq was directly involved in planning and conducting attacks outside of Somalia.
The operation was conducted on Saturday afternoon south of the capital, Mogadishu.
The US is fighting an ongoing campaign to take out the leadership of the al Qaeda-linked group. Last September, a US drone strike killed the group's main leader, Ahmed Abdi Godane, while another strike in late December killed intelligence chief Tahlil Abdishakur.
Al-Shabab is an ultra-conservative Islamic militant group that has steadily lost territory to a military offensive by Somalia and African forces. It had controlled Mogadishu and southern Somalia until it was driven out of the capital in 2011.
But the group has still shown the capability of carrying out terrorist attacks, launching guerilla attacks and bombings. In November, the group killed 28 people on board a bus in Kenya, and 36 non-Muslim quarry workers in early December. It was also behind a 2013 raid on a Nairobi shopping center that killed 67 people.
jr/bk (AFP, AP, Reuters)