Washington - Eight more Somali-Americans from the US Midwest have been charged with terrorism, bringing to 14 the total suspects in the wide-ranging case, media reports said Tuesday. The newest terrorism charges were filed Monday in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where the court documents described how 20 local men were recruited, indoctrinated and trained to fight in Somalia.
Six men were previously charged with similar crimes. All but one of the 20 suspects was of Somali descent, federal prosecutors said.
Most of the eight new suspects have fled the country. They were charged with providing financial support and fighting for al-Shabaab, an Islamist insurgent group that has waged terror in Somalia.
Ralph Boelter, special agent in charge of the FBI's Minneapolis office, said there was no evidence that citizens with US passports were returning home after being trained in terrorism, The Minneapolis Star Tribune reported.
Such a pattern has been a concern expressed by justice officials as well as members of Congress.
The court records described how young Somali men started being seduced in 2007 by recruiters who urged them to help defend their home country against Ethiopian troops that had helped oust a fundamentalist Islamist government.
Al-Shabaab has been attacking Ethiopian troops, African Union peacekeeping forces and the internationally supported transitional federal government (TFG) in the ungovernable Horn of Africa country.
All told, the plot involved about 20 men. Four have already pleaded guilty. Another five are believed to have been killed in Somalia, along with a Muslim convert from Minneapolis, The Star reported.
A key figure in the plot was Cabdulaahi Ahmed Faarax, who had the nicknames of "Ahmed Mardaadi" and "Adacki." Faarax told the recruits that "jihad would be fun" and that they would "get to shoot guns," the court documents said.
Another key person was Abdiweli Yassin Isse, who allegedly misled the community into donating money with the ruse that it would send young men to Saudi Arabia to study the Koran.
The Somali immigrant community in Minneapolis is one of the nation's largest. The suspects make up one of the largest alleged terrorist networks in the US since security barriers were raised after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
According to the charging documents, the US recruits allegedly stayed at safe houses in Somalia and were trained at an al-Shabaab camp that included dozens of others from Somalia, elsewhere in Africa, Europe and the US. They purportedly learned to use small arms, machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades.
"The sad reality is that the vibrant Somali community here in Minneapolis has lost many of its sons to fighting in Somalia," said US Attorney B Todd Jones in a statement.
"Those tempted to fight on behalf of or provide support to any designated terrorist group should know they will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law."
