Tuesday December 26, 2017
A member of Al-Shabaab controls residents as they participate in a demonstration against Kenyans' incursion inside Somalia in Elasha, outside Mogadishu, October 27, 2011. REUTERS
Mogadishu (HOL) - Al-Shabaab militants on Sunday said they publicly executed five men, including a teenager in Idale village, 60km (37) south of Baidoa town.
The five were accused of spying for the country's Western-backed government, the United States, according to the group's court.
A militant judge said that men were found guilty and had admitted spying the United States and the Somali government.
The victims - Mahad Ali Hassan, Jibril Salah Hajji, Mahad Abdi Ahmed, Mohamed Ali Adan and Abdiaziz Ibrahim Mohamed - were then summarily executed by a firing squad after an Al-Shabaab judge convicted them based on their alleged confessions.
The judge accused them of trying to obtain the phone contacts for prominent Al-Shabaab leaders.
According to witnesses who attended the hearing, the judge did not release the confession.
The relatives of the deceased denied that they were spies.
It is not the first the militants have executed their fellow Al-Shabaab members.
In November, the group shot four men accused of spying in public execution in Buale town, the headquarters of Middle Jubba region.
Al-Shabaab was pushed out of Mogadishu in 2011 but continues to carry out attacks on military bases, government institutions and other civilian densely populated areas.