Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, the al Qaida operative behind the 1998 US embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania (AP)
AP
Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, the al Qaida operative behind the 1998 US embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania (AP)
The al Qaida mastermind behind the 1998 bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania has been killed this week at a security checkpoint in Mogadishu by Somali forces who did not immediately realise they had killed the most wanted man in East Africa, officials said.
The death of Fazul Abdullah Mohammed - a man who topped the FBI's most wanted list for nearly 13 years - is another major strike against the worldwide terror group which was headed by Osama bin Laden until his death last month.
Mohammed had a 5 million dollar (£3.1 million) bounty on his head for allegedly planning the August 7 1998 embassy bombings, which killed 224 people in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Most of the dead were Kenyans. Twelve Americans also died.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton - who was on a visit to Tanzania as Somali officials confirmed Mohammed's death - called the killing a "significant blow to al Qaida, its extremist allies, and its operations in East Africa.
"It is a just end for a terrorist who brought so much death and pain to so many innocents in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam and elsewhere - Tanzanians, Kenyans, Somalis, and our own embassy personnel," she said.
Mohammed was killed on Tuesday but was carrying a South African passport, so Somali officials did not immediately realise who he was. The body was even buried but officials later exhumed it.
"We've compared the pictures of the body to his old pictures," said a spokesman for Somalia's minister of information, Abdifatah Abdinur. "They are the same. It is confirmed. He is the man and he is dead. The man who died is Fazul Abdullah."
Mohammed, a native of the Comoros Islands, was carrying sophisticated weapons, maps and other operational materials as well as tens of thousands of dollars when he was killed, said information minister Abdulkareem Jama. Family pictures and correspondence with other militants were also found, he said. The money, equipment and personal effects made officials take a second look at the death, he added.
Mohammed's death is the third major blow against al Qaida in the last six weeks. Navy Seals killed al Qaida leader Osama bin Laden on May 2 at his home in Pakistan. Just a month later, Ilyas Kashmiri, an al Qaida leader sought in the 2008 Mumbai siege and rumoured to be a longshot choice to succeed bin Laden, was reportedly killed in a US drone attack in Pakistan.
A senior official in Barack Obama's administration called Mohammed's death "a big win for global counter-terrorism efforts.