The United States announced Thursday it is offering up to $10 million for information leading to the capture of a man touted as the “terrorist mastermind” of a 2019 hotel attack in Kenya that killed at least 21 people, including an American.
The U.S. is looking for Mohamoud Abdi Aden, whom it portrays as a leader of the Somalia-based Islamist group Shebab that has carried out several bloody attacks in neighboring Kenya.
The Shebab, an al-Qaeda affiliated group, had claimed responsibility for the Jan. 15, 2019 attack on the upscale DusitD2 hotel in the capital Nairobi, during a siege that lasted about 20 hours. At least 21 people had been killed, including a U.S. citizen, and many others injured.
Kenyan authorities said at the time that all the attackers had been killed. “Mohamoud Abdi Aden, a Shebab leader, was part of the cell that planned the attack on the DusitD2 hotel,” U.S. Ambassador to Kenya Meg Whitman told journalists in Nairobi.
She said the United States was offering a reward of up to $10 million for information leading to the arrest of the man, believed to be a Kenyan national, and others involved in the hotel siege.
The head of Kenya’s Criminal Investigation Department, Amin Mohamed Ibrahim, called Aden the “terrorist mastermind” of the attack. The Shebab have carried out several attacks in Kenya since the country sent its military into Somalia in October 2011 to fight the radical Islamist group.
The Shebab, an al-Qaeda affiliated group, has been fighting the internationally backed federal government since 2007. They have been considered a terrorist group by Washington since 2008.
In November, the United States announced it was offering up to $10 million for information leading to the identification of three radical Islamist Shebab leaders in Somalia, Ahmed Diriye, Mahad Karate and Jehad Mostafa.