Pointing to several similarities between the Mumbai attacks in 2008, the Nairobi Westgate mall attack in 2013 and the recent Paris attacks, Kenya’s national counter-terrorism chief says the UN and NATO countries must drop “double standards” on terror. “The problem is that the same level of attention is not given to the same problem in different parts of the world. If they are so concerned about the refugee crisis in Europe, why did they not pay attention when the same refugees were pouring in through the horn of Africa? We say, don’t focus on one foe that you have identified like Islamic State, terror is a borderless problem, focus on it across the world”, Director of the National Counter-terrorism Centre in Nairobi, Martin Kimani told The Hindu in an exclusive interview, adding that groups like Al-Shabaab and the Lashkar e Toiba must face the same focus.
Dr. Kimani heads Kenya’s nodal agency that deals with intelligence as well as operations on the threat from Islamist terror group Al-Shabaab that has killed thousands in Africa, including the attack at the Westgate mall in which 68 people were killed, of which 2 were Indian nationals, and the Garissa University massacre where 147 students were gunned down by a group of terrorists in April 2015.
In Mumbai for a conference on Megacity Security organised by the US Embassy along with the Atlantic Council and India Foundation, timed in the week of the 26/11 attack anniversary, Mr. Kimani says the similiarities in the attacks by Al-Shabaab and the Lashkar e Toiba as well as by the IS in Paris go well beyond the mechanics of the attacks.
All three attacks were carried out by a small group of AK-47 wielding gunmen who had come with “no expectation of survival”, and targeting innocent civilians in public places. According to Mr. Kimani, the common thread was to target the economy and tourism in the three cities, to kill several nationalities gathered there, and ensure live transmission of the attacks over television and social media. “I feel it is this magnification of their message that is their real goal. In that sense, they achieved their missions in Mumbai, Nairobi, and now in Paris,” he says. Equally, each of the attacks were planned and trained for in a neighbouring country, and a coordinated response is required, as Kenya has worked with Somalian forces to shut down terror camps inside Somalia. Drawing a similar parallel between the conflicts in Afghanistan-Pakistan, Syria-Iraq and Libya, that have been the ideological breeding grounds for LeT, IS and Al-Shabaab, Mr. Kimani warned that Western and NATO interventions in these places have often been counter-productive. “What we (African Union) had been warning about, a vaccum in Libya helping these (jihadist) groups has unfortunately turned out to be true. They (western countries) must understand that stability is not a dirty word, and their actions in the Middle east and Africa against leaders have turned out to be very destabilizing and dangerous.”
To a question about whether the problem was that all three groups adhere to Islamic texts, Dr. Kimani said, “It is not the religion that drives the violence. When it comes to groups like Al-Shabaab, Al-Qaeda or IS, it is their desire violence that drives the interpretation of the text,” adding that all faith leaders must reinforce the message that religion doesn’t condone the violence.
Speaking about the problem of local youth joining violent groups in other countries like IS, Mr. Kimani says it is also important to try and “give them a way out of their bad choices”. “Quite a number were told they were part of a great cause to fight for Muslims but when they joined they found there was nothing Islamic about the force that regularly rapes women, that is murderous, uses drugs,” he said about the NCTC ‘s rehabilitation and counter-radicalisation programme that he claims has brought back 800 young men and women since 2014.
> Read excerpted transcripts of the exclusive interview here
