Friday April 17, 2020
Mogadishu (HOL) - A dodgy report published by two leading Kenyan newspapers asserting that Somalia's intelligence agency is in cahoots with Al-Shabaab militants has been debunked by a senior official at Taaj Money Transfer.
The report attributed to an unknown "insider" in the Al-Shabaab, claims that top leaders in Somalia’s National Intelligence and Security Agency (NISA) are working hand in hand with the Al-Qaeda linked militants to sabotage relations between the two east African countries by attacking KDF soldiers fighting in Somalia.
"Some of these senior officers are providing highly confidential security information on Kenyan security agencies and personnel to al Shabaab to facilitate the militant group’s targeting of Kenyan security personnel," the report alleges.
Hiiraan Online has not seen a copy of the intelligence report.
The newspapers published a copy of the alleged receipt for USD 1.5 million made payable to Sheikh Filow from Abdullahi Aden Kulane
The Taaj official, who asked we conceal his identity because he is not authorized to speak on the matter, said that the receipt published by The Star and The Standard newspapers were fakes.
"That receipt is fake, it appears that it has been doctored." He went on to say that the existence of the dubious receipt has been known to senior Taaj officials for nearly two weeks now.
"Those (confirmation) numbers on the receipt do not exist in our system."
It appears that the intelligence report originally surfaced on an anti-government Facebook page called "Mudaaharaadka 7 Of February" earlier this month.
On 8 April, the Facebook page published an alleged WhatsApp conversation between senior NISA official Abdullahi Kulane and a mid-level Shabaab commander, Yasiin Filo.
The messages were reportedly photographed off a captured AS phone. Three days later they posted another WhatsApp exchange and included a copy of the questionable Taaj remittance receipt.
Tensions between Kenya and Somalia are at a historic low after clashes between Somali federal troops and those loyal to Madobe spilt into Kenya's border in mid-March.
The Kenyan government claimed the violence “amounts to an unwarranted attack by foreign soldiers with the intention of provoking Kenya.
” For their part, Somali troops were in hot pursuit of Jubbaland’s fugitive security minister, Abdirashid Janan, who was arrested in Mogadishu last year but escaped in January and is allegedly responsible for torture and other human rights abuses. At least 11 people were killed in the Somali border town of Bula-hawo.