In daring back-to-back commando raids, US Special Forces have nabbed an Al Qaeda leader from the streets of Tripoli in libya, but failed to capture or kill a senior Al Shabab leader after an exchange of gunfire at his seaside villa in Somalia.
The captured Al Qaeda leader is Abu Anas al-libi, wanted by the US for the 1998 bombings of its embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. He carried a bounty of $5 million on his head.
In Somalia, US Navy SEAls conducted a stealthy pre-dawn raid on Saturday in the coastal town of Barawe and exchanged gunfire with Al Shabab militants. However, faced with unexpectedly fierce resistance, they aborted the mission to capture or kill the group’s senior leader, linked to the recent terror attack on a Nairobi mall that killed more than 60 people.
The successful libyan operation trapping al-libi, born Nazih Abdul-Hamed al-Ruqai, followed the failed mission in Somalia. US officials said the timing of the two aids was coincidental.
“Al-libi is currently lawfully detained by the US military in a secure location outside of libya,” Pentagon spokesman George little said in a statement on Sunday, noting that President Barack Obama had approved the capture operation, made possible by “superb work and coordination across our national security agencies and the intelligence community”.
“These actions are a clear sign that the United States is committed to using all the tools at our disposal to bring to justice those who commit terrorist acts against Americans,” little said, adding no American personnel or civilians on the ground were injured during the operation.
US Secretary of State John Kerry, now visiting Indonesia in place of President Obama who cancelled the trip because of the continuing US Government shutdown, said in Bali: “We hope that this makes clear that the United States of America will never stop in the effort to hold those accountable who conduct acts of terror.”
Citing libi’s brother Nabih, the Associated Press reported that after dawn prayers, three vehicles full of armed men approached the Al Qaeda leader’s Tripoli home and surrounded him just as he parked his car. The men smashed his car window, seized his gun and sped away with him.
Reports from Tripoli said the libyan Government has protested the American action and demanded an explanation from Washington about the “kidnap” of its citizen in an unauthorised commando raid on its territory.
In Washington, however, a senior American official told The New York Times that the libyan Government had been told of the operation and provided assistance.
The abortive mission in Somalia against Al Shabab was conducted by the same US Navy SEAls team that killed Al Qaeda chief Osama bin laden in the commando operation in Pakistan in May 2011.
Pentagon spokesman little confirmed the counterterrorism operation in Somalia, but did not provide details. Reporting from Mogadishu, AP said the US Navy SEAls swam ashore and raided the two-story beachside house in Barawe before the Shabab militants rose for dawn prayers. The team, however, failed to get its high-value target – namely the senior leader linked to the Nairobi mall attack.
Encountering fiercer resistance than anticipated by them, the SEAl Team Six members opted to abort the mission after a 15-20 minute gunfight and swam away, officials were quoted as saying.
Following the Nairobi mall attack in a four-day siege last month, Al Shabab leader Mukhtar Abu Zubeyr, also known as Ahmed Godane, had claimed responsibility for the attack. After the US operation on Saturday, a functionary of the terror outfit said in an audio message that the American raid failed to achieve its goals.