Tuesday, July 05, 2016
By: Ruth Bender
Man detained as he returned to Germany from Somalia
Wrecked cars burn at the scene of a terror attack by al Qaeda-linked al-Shabaab at Mogadishu’s Ambassador Hotel last year. German police arrested a 28-year-old German on suspicion of belonging to al-Shabaab on Monday. PHOTO: MOHAMED ABDIWAHAB/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES
BERLIN—German police have arrested a 28-year-old German on suspicion of belonging to the Somalia-based Islamist group al-Shabaab and preparing an act of violence, the country’s federal prosecutor said Tuesday.
Police arrested the man identified as Abshir Ahmed A. on Monday at Frankfurt’s airport when he returned to Germany from Somalia, the prosecutor’s office said in a statement.
The prosecutor’s office said a preliminary investigation showed that the man in 2012 joined al-Shabaab, an al Qaeda-aligned militant group that has stepped up the pace and the intensity of its attacks in recent months.
The 28-year-old allegedly received training in the use of weapons in Somalia and then was stationed in a defensive position for the militant group in the country, the prosecutor’s office said.
Al-Shabaab has increased the scale of its strikes against the Somali government and neighboring states over the past year. The group controls parts of Somali territory, where it has attempted to impose a harsh form of Islamic law.
The group claimed responsibility for the 2013 assault on the Westgate mall in Nairobi, which killed 67 people. More recent attacks include the killing of nearly 150 people at a university in Garissa in April last year. In February, the insurgent group also launched a failed attempt to bring down a passenger jet.
Germany’s domestic intelligence agency in its 2015 report released last week said it wasn’t aware of any organizational structures of the militant group in Germany.