05/2012 08:17:00 Emmanuel Ogala
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Boko Haram has become Nigeria's biggest headache of the moment
A security report before the presidency indicates that the extremist sect recently received a huge financial donation from a group in the North African country

The extremist Boko Haram sect, which has since 2009 launched sustained attacks on security installations, places of worship, educational institutions and media outfits, recently got cash support of N40 million from an Algerian terrorist group, an intelligence report recently submitted to the presidency has said.

The report, a product of a joint police and military investigations and raids, carried out in Kano and Sokoto in December 2011 indicates that the Algerian sect gave out the funds as its first installment in a planned long term partnership with Boko Haram.

According to the report, seen by PREMIUM TIMES, the Boko Haram sect and the unnamed Algerian terrorist group have met a number of times in their bid to hammer out modalities for a long term partnership.

The document quoted some arrested members of the sect as having made the confession.

The partnership would see the richer, more influential, and more organized Algerian terror gang mentor members of the Boko Haram through trainings in activities that will help it fortify its financial base locally. 

The Algerian sect is also expected to train the Boko Haram insurgents in hostage taking and weapon handling.

The report provides an insight into how the dreaded Nigerian sect has been funding its activities. The sect members have been fingered for a string of bank robberies, and there is also deep suspicion that they receive discreet support from local politicians.  

But it has never been this established that the group receives donations from overseas.

Al Qaeda links

The extremist Boko Haram sect has of recent been linked to international terror gangs like the Al Qaeda.

The first official document linking the group to Al Qaeda is a United States’ cable dated June 29, 2009, leaked by Wikileaks. The cable, written before the Boko Haram sect began its terror campaigns in August that year, documented the sect’s link to a well-trained veteran Chadian extremist, Abu-Mahjin.

The cable described Abu-Mahjin as having “limited ties to al-Qa'ida associates,” and was, on behalf of the Boko Haram sect, seeking more funds to facilitate a massive terrorist attack. The extremist sect began its terror attack on the Nigerian state two months after the cable was written.

Boko Haram’s successes in attacking defenceless religious congregations, bank robberies, and vandalization of police armouries validated its growing link with established terrorist groups outside the country.

Previous security intelligence on the sect suggests that its recent transformation, successes, and organization is partly because of the help it received from al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), a branch of the international terrorist network based in the Saharan states of Mali, Niger and Algeria.

In January this year, The UK Guardian interviewed the sect's spokesperson, Abu Qaqa, who reportedly said his group’s leaders met with high ranking members of al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia during a pilgrimage in August 2011.

The meeting, Mr. Qaqa told the paper, was to finalise the group’s financial and logistics arrangements with Al-Qaeda.

“Al-Qaeda are our elder brothers,” he told the Guardian. “We enjoy financial and technical support from them. Anything we want from them we ask them.”

A UN report released shortly after the Libyan crisis also said weapons from Libya may have been smuggled to Boko Haram in Nigeria.

Both the government and its security agencies had, in the past, claimed the group gets foreign funding and support from other terror gangs like Al Ahabab in Somalia. 

Kidnap Training

The intelligence report, which is now lying in a shelf at the president’s office, also detailed how members of the Boko Haram sect recently got trainings in kidnapping from the same Algerian terrorist sect.

The report listed names of nine members of the terror sect who had successfully received trainings in kidnappings, in addition to bomb making skills. 

As its part of the deal, Boko Haram is expected to kidnap white skinned foreigners - especially expatriates - in Abuja and exchange them for more money and arms and ammunitions with the Algerian sect. “Or demand ransom as the case may be,” the report said.

As at the time of the investigation, December 2011, the sect had finalised its kidnap strategy and was scouting for houses to keep their kidnap victims and suitable cars to transport them across the desert.

“They are targeting expatriates from (Julius) Berger, and Dantata and sawoe as well as other places they could find any,” the report said.

The report claims that  a cell of the sect led by one Abu Mohammad carried out the kidnap of “white men” - a Brit and an Italian. 

Both men were later killed in February this year during an attempt to rescue them by a combined squad of british and Nigerian security agents.

The Boko Haram terrorist sect, however, denied involvement in the kidnapping in one of its teleconferences shortly after the incident.

Transformed sect

Boko Haram set out seeking to impose a stricter form of Sharia or Islamic law in northern Nigeria and end corruption.

Violence by the group, which had only religious interest in the past, is traceable to the five days of clashes in July 2009 between the group and members of the security forces in Borno, Yobe, Bauchi, and Kano states that left more than 800 people dead, including at least 30 police officers.

The police summarily executed the captured Boko Haram leader, Mohammed Yusuf, along with several dozens of his followers in front of the police headquarters in Maiduguri.

Dozens of its members were also arrested.

Boko Haram frequently said its attacks on the government, especially the police, are in revenge for these killings and an attempt to set free members incarcerated by the police.

Political collaboration

Recently, the ideology behind Boko Haram attacks got more confusing with increasing attacks on schools, media houses and almost any soft target within its reach.

The National Security Adviser, Andrew Owoye Azazi, in a recent public appearance, said the group was a creation of the disgruntled members of the ruling People’s Democratic Party, PDP.

He said members of the party, angered by the emergence of President Goodluck Jonathan, created the group to destabilize the government. He also admitted the sect had members trained by more sophisticated international counterparts. source:http://premiumtimesng.com/news/5079-boko_haram_gets_n40million_donation_from_algeria.html

Change the title of this post!
What has Algeria got to do with some Islamist sect?
It is like addressing Bok Boiz as Nigeria.

seriously am very confused o. This boko haram has turn something else o, today is pdp, 2moro al quaeda or al shabab, now we are hearing algeria. no body knows exactly what's happening in the country. Not even the security adviser. I sorry 4 my people.

*hisses*
this was probably dreamt up by some reporter who was facing the threat of being fired ny his/her employer

Probably Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM)

THE TELEGRAPH

Al-Qaeda’s hand in Boko Haram's deadly Nigerian attacks



A victim of a bomb blast that ripped through the United Nations offices in the Nigerian capital of Abuja is loaded into an ambulance. Boko Haram claimed responsibility for the attack

Picture: REUTERS

By David Blair, Abuja

Last Updated: 8:23AM GMT 06/02/2012

Al-Qaeda operatives in North Africa have helped to transform Boko Haram into a terrorist group capable of killing hundreds in sophisticated attacks.

The radical Islamist group, based in northern Nigeria, once specialised in robbing banks and attacking defenceless Christian congregations. In the past month, however, its gunmen or suicide bombers have struck 21 times, killing at least 253 people.

The Daily Telegraph understands this transformation has come about partly because of the help Boko Haram has received from al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), a branch of the international terrorist network based in the Saharan states of Mali, Niger and Algeria.

Boko Haram demonstrated its new potency on Jan 20, when at least 100 of the movement's fighters executed eight assaults in Nigeria's northern city of Kano, overwhelming the security forces and killing 185 people.

This operation bore all the hallmarks of al-Qaeda: a mixture of suicide bombers and gunmen, some in police or army uniform, carried out multiple, carefully coordinated attacks on hard targets.

Boko Haram destroyed two police stations and the regional police headquarters, and damaged the local office of the State Security Service, Nigeria's version of MI5.

Al-Qaeda's influence was also evident from the choice of weapons: car bombs exploded outside some targets, while police found caches of "improvised explosive devices", with detonators and shrapnel packed into soft drinks cans.

Since then, Boko Haram has kept up the momentum, launching night raids on two more police stations in Kano.

Officials and experts in the Nigerian capital of Abuja believe Boko Haram has learnt its new capabilities from AQIM. Niger, a key operating theatre for AQIM, shares a largely unmarked frontier with Nigeria, spanning 900 miles of desert and scrub.

Boko Haram probably has little need for weapons or money as its fighters are accomplished bank robbers and whenever they raid a police station, they usually empty the armoury. AQIM's contribution is most likely to be in tactics and expertise, with Boko Haram fighters taken out of Nigeria for training.

While the country has a long history of political and religious violence, experts point to the novelty of Boko Haram's techniques.

"Suicide bombing was, until recently, something we saw in the movies," said Chinedu Nwagu, a security analyst from the Cleen Foundation, which monitors Nigeria's justice system.

"People never thought that anybody here would do that."

The Kano attacks, he added, showed a degree of "coordination that you would not just pick up without very specialised training".

Abubakar Tsav, a former Nigerian police commissioner, said: "They [Boko Haram] clearly have some connections with outsiders."

Once, Boko Haram would steer clear of the security forces and strike largely undefended targets. Today, its fighters frequently outclass and outgun their opponents. "Their weapons and tactics are clearly superior to those used by the Nigerian police," said Yahaya Ibrahim Shinko, a retired Nigerian army officer and security analyst.

If AQIM has passed on training and expertise, it may also transmit al-Qaeda's world view and its international targets. Britain, which is home to an estimated 150,000 Nigerians, could be vulnerable.

So far Boko Haram's agenda has been entirely domestic and there is no evidence the leadership aims to strike outside the country.

Mr Nwagu said: "Boko Haram is very inviting for whatever influences there might be out there."


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/al-qaeda/9062825/Al-Qaedas-hand-in-Boko-Harams-deadly-Nigerian-attacks.html

Read the wikipedia article for AQIM here http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Qaeda_Organization_in_the_Islamic_Maghreb


Part of the article reads - "In November 2007 Nigerian authorities arrested five men for alleged possession of seven sticks of dynamite and other explosives. Nigerian prosecutors alleged that three of the accused had trained for two years with the then Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat in Algeria.[27] In January 2008 the Dakar Rally was cancelled due to threats made by associated terrorist organizations."

Boko Haram = Al-Qaeda = C.I.A = U.S

See evidence here

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article31276.htm