Is Somalia now playing the Pakistan to Yemen's Afghanistan?
The case is intriguing, partly because it provides some of the first indications that extremists in Somalia and Yemen may be linking up; and partly because Ahmed Abdulkadir Warsame’s arrival for trial in New York around midnight on July 4th reignites the debate about the legal justification for flying military detainees into US jurisdiction from overseas.
Somali terror suspect Ahmed Abdulkadir Warsame is facing charges of assisting terror groups in Yemen and Somalia, after being detained on a US Navy ship for more than two months. Foreign Affairs correspondent Jonathan Rugman reports.
This case is intriguing, partly because it provides some of the first indications that extremists in Somalia and Yemen may be linking up; and partly because Ahmed Abdulkadir Warsame’s arrival for trial in New York around midnight on July 4th reignites the debate about the legal justification for flying military detainees into US jurisdiction from overseas.
Mr Warsame was apparently captured on April 19th on a fishing trawler between Somalia and Yemen. The Americans claim the Somali went to Yemen in 2010 and received explosives there, as well as brokering a weapons deal between Somali and Yemeni extremists.
If true, this is hugely significant. It suggests Mr Warsame was a courier between two hitherto separate conflicts and organisations, both of which threaten the west. British Intelligence believes that scores of young British muslims have travelled to Somalia to train and fight. Although I have seen no evidence that these Britons have returned to the UK intent on violence, any growing link between Somalia and Yemen potentially increases the threat to the UK.
After all, Al Qaeda in Yemen has tried to mount direct attacks on the West, with the failed attempt to blow up an airliner over Detroit in 2009 and with explosives smuggled into printer cartridges on cargo and passenger planes. One of these bombs was intercepted in the UK last year.
The current UK threat level is “Severe” – meaning a terrorist attack is “highly likely” – a level largely determined by the threat from Yemen within the past 18 months.
The question has to be whether Somalia is now playing Pakistan to Yemen’s Afghanistan, or vice versa – whether we are witnessing the birth of a maritime version of the dangerously porous “Afpak” border, this time between the Horn of Africa and Arabia.
Follow Jonathan Rugman on Twitter: @jrug