United Nations: Al-Shabab Remains 'Potent Threat' in Somalia and Region

Al-Shabab extremists in Somalia remain "a potent threat" to regional peace and are now manufacturing home-made explosives, expanding their revenue sources and infiltrating government institutions, U.N. experts say.

The panel of experts' report to the Security Council, circulated Tuesday, said a significant escalation of U.S. airstrikes targeting al-Shabab militants and leaders has kept the al-Qaida-linked group "off-balance" but has had "little effect on its ability to launch regular asymmetric attacks throughout Somalia." 

The report said al-Shabab's assault on Jan. 15 on a commercial business complex in Nairobi, Kenya, containing the DusitD2 Hotel "illustrates the danger the group continues to pose to regional peace and security." That attack killed 21 people as well as four gunmen.

The experts also cited "an unprecedented number" of attacks across the Kenya-Somalia border by al-Shabab in June and July, "possibly in an effort to exploit strained relations between the two countries."  

Kenya's police chief says a roadside bomb has killed 11 officers on the country's southern border with Somalia.

Inspector General Hillary Mutyambai said Saturday the officers' patrol car was blown up on Damajale Hare Hare road near the town of Liboi. No one has claimed responsibility for the bomb, but al-Shabab militants from Somalia are suspected.

The al-Qaida-linked group has increasingly targeted Kenyan security forces in recent years.

Officers' patrol car was blown up on Damajale Hare Hare road near the town of Liboi

The panel, which monitors sanctions against Somalia, also reported on the arrest last Dec. 17 of a Somali national linked to the Islamic State extremist group in Bari, Italy, in connection with a planned attack on the Vatican and other targets to coincide with Christmas celebrations.

The experts said the plot by Omar Moshin Ibrahim, also known as Anas Khalil, to plant a bomb in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome on Christmas Day "was rudimentary and had little chance of success." Intercepted communications indicated Ibrahim devised the plan on his own and was not directly tasked by Islamic State operatives outside the country, the panel said.

Still, the Vatican plan was the first instance in which Islamic State elements in Somalia "were directly linked to an attempted terrorist attack outside the country," it said.

After three decades of civil war, extremist attacks and famine, Somalia established a functioning transitional government in 2012 and has since been working to rebuild stability. But U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said it must still tackle violent extremism, terrorism, armed conflict, political instability and corruption.

The panel said money is not a limiting factor for al-Shabab, saying its "taxation" of all aspects of Somalia's economy "is undiminished, and has likely expanded."

The experts cited preliminary evidence indicating al-Shabab has started taxing imports into the port of Mogadishu.

"The group also continues to take advantage of virtually unregulated mobile money and domestic banking services to collect and transfer revenues throughout the country," the report said.