US – Somalia: Young Americans joining rebel forces in Somalia

The United States senate has been informed by officials that the country is investigating several of its citizens of Somali descent who returned to Somalia to join al-Shabaab, an Islamist militia group with links to al-Qaeda. According to the BBC, the Islamist guerrilla group controls much of southern and central Somalia. Andrew Liepman, deputy director for intelligence at the National Counterterrorism Center claims that the young men left to fight for their homeland and not to join al-Qaeda, insisting that the al-Shabaab does not have strong ties with al-Qaeda. Last October, an American of Somali descent from Minneapolis blew himself up in a suicide bomb attempt.