A fully armed MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aerial vehicle taxis down the runway at an air base in Afghanistan on its way to another wartime mission. (U.S. Air Force photo/Staff Sgt. Brian Ferguson).
On February 12, the United States Africa Command (AFRICOM) announced that it had killed 12 terrorists of al-Qaeda-affiliated Harakat al-Shabaab al-Mujahideen in Somalia in support of that country’s federal government and army.
In a statement, the command said that the strike occurred in a remote area approximately 45 kilometers southwest of Hobyo, and about 472 kilometers northeast of Mogadishu.
“The initial assessment is that the strike killed 12 al-Shabaab fighters,” the statement reads. Given the remote location of the operation, the command assesses that no civilians were injured or killed.”
This was not the first U.S. strike to target al-Shabaab in Somalia this year. Last month, some 30 terrorists of the group were killed in a similar strike, according to AFRICOM.
Al-Shabaab has been waging an insurgency against Somalia’s federal government for more than 15 years, despite facing competition from other terrorist group’s like ISIS. The group’s terrorists were driven out of Mogadishu in 2011 by an African Union force with military support from the U.S.
The U.S. has provided ongoing support to the Somali government since President Joe Biden last May approved a Pentagon request to redeploy troops in Somalia in order to counter al-Shabaab. The move reversed a decision by former President Donald Trump to withdraw all troops from the country.
