Terror threat raises US interest in Africa

SHAKE DJIBOUTI: A US Army Humvee enters Camp Lemonier in Djibouti where some 1,800 troops are based for counterterrorism operations. KAREL PRINSLOO/AP/FILE

JOHANNESBURG, SOUTH AFRICA - As he's swept across the continent, visiting a slave house in Senegal, a factory in South Africa, and a safari lodge in Botswana, President Bush has emphasized what America can do for Africa. He's hyped his $15 billion pledge for AIDS and promised to open American markets to African products.

But the president's five-day, five-nation tour is also about what Africa can do for America, particularly regarding terrorism. The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks have increased the global significance of Africa, with its poverty, failed states, mineral wealth, and 250 million Muslims, making the continent a potential haven and source of funding for groups like Al Qaeda.

Since 1998, there have been four attacks in Africa, including one late last year in Kenya, believed to have been organized by Al Qaeda or associated groups, costing almost 300 lives. Countries like Sudan and Somalia are reported to have sheltered the terror organization's members, while diamonds from places like Liberia and Sierra Leone may have been used to fund its operations. And just last month, five men with alleged ties to Al Qaeda were arrested in Malawi.

Mr. Bush has pledged $100 million to help East African countries improve their counterterrorism efforts, including border security - most of those arrested in recent terror attacks are non-Africans. Since late last year, the US has had 1,800 troops in Djibouti conducting counterterrorism operations.

Friday Bush will travel to Uganda, a key American ally in East Africa, much of which has been under a terror warning since the beginning of the year because of reported Al Qaeda presence there. Uganda was one of the few countries on the continent to publicly support the war in Iraq, and according to The New York Times, the US is seeking military refueling agreements there and with several other African countries, including Senegal and Mali.

Analysts say the president's new emphasis on peace in places like the Sudan and Liberia marks an important shift. Three years ago, Bush said he did not see what strategic interest Africa had to the US. Today, he is considering sending troops to the tumultuous West African nation of Liberia. According to an April report put out by Global Witness, a nongovernmental organization based in London, Al Qaeda purchased diamonds in Liberia and Sierra Leone to fund its operations.

Administration statements that the stability of Liberia is important to the war on terror represent "a recognition that failed states are a big part of the problem," says Daniel Benjamin, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

Many African observers, however, say an effective antiterrorism agenda in Africa must also tackle the poverty and instability that create a breeding ground for radicalism. There is a danger, says Greg Mills, director of the South African Institute of International Relations, that the continent's long-term development needs could be overwhelmed by its short-term military needs.

"The war on terror has to focus on the conditions that give rise to terrorism, which is underdevelopment, poverty, and the inability of the state to meet these needs," says Mr. Mills. "It has to address the same sort of root causes which allow Al Qaeda to operate and also give rise to some of Africa's local paramilitaries."

In East Africa, where American and British terror warnings have seriously depressed already struggling but economically vital tourist industries, some say the US should do something to compensate them. Ministers in Kenya have called for monetary compensation, saying the warnings are costing the country $1 million a day.

Many in Kenya feel snubbed because the president dropped the country from his itinerary because of security concerns after a November attack on a hotel in the seaside resort of Mombasa killed 13Kenyans and Israeli tourists.

"We feel that as a country we have been punished because of America, we have been attacked because of our perceived alignment with the United States and Israel," says Maria Nzomo, director of the Institute for Diplomacy and International Studies at the University of Nairobi. "We have suffered so much and Bush doesn't seen to appreciate it."

Observers like Mr. Nzomo and Mills hope Bush's trip will lead to a more sustained involvement by the American government in Africa. But not everyone is convinced that the administration's action will keep pace with its rhetoric.

"I would say it's too early to say whether these have been substantive change in terms of Africa policy," says Mr. Benjamin. "We haven't really seen the kind of sustained engagement in conflict resolution in Africa now that we saw in the last administration."

January 1976 - Five men are arrested near the Nairobi, Kenya, airport as they prepare to fire missiles from shoulder-held launchers at an Israeli airliner. The suspects were taken to Israel for trial and sentenced to long prison terms.

December 1980 - A bomb blast wrecks the Jewish-owned Norfolk Hotel in Nairobi, killing 15 people and wounding over 80. It was claimed by a shadowy Arab group in retaliation for Kenya allowing Israeli troops to refuel in Nairobi during their raid on Uganda's Entebbe airport to rescue hostages from a hijacked aircraft.

August 1998 - Truck bombs explode at the US embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania. The bombs kill 224 people, including 12 Americans, and injure thousands. All but 10 of the deaths are in Nairobi, where damage is the worst.

August 1998 - The US military launches strikes against what President Clinton said were Sudanese terrorist bases behind the bombings of the US Embassies. The owner of the El-Shifa pharmaceutical plant in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, denies any affiliation with Osama bin Laden's network.

May 2002 - US officials arrest a suspected Al Qaeda operative accused of firing a surface-to-air missile at a US aircraft in Saudi Arabia.

November 2002 - Three suicide car bombers kill 13 people at a Kenyan hotel used by Israelis, and shoulder-launched missiles were fired at an Israeli airliner leaving Nairobi's airport, missing the plane.

June 2003 - Five suspects accused of funneling money to Mr. Osama bin Laden's terror organization are arrested in Malawi as part of a joint US-Malawian operation. The suspects had been on the CIA's watchlist since the 1998 embassy bombings.

2003 - The US has obtained or is seeking base or refueling agreements with Djibouti, Mali, Uganda, and Senegal.

Why radicals find fertile ground in moderate Kenya*** "Kenyans do not have the wherewithal, nor the character, to start up their own homegrown international terror organization," says Moustapha Hassouna, a professor of security studies at the University of Nairobi. "But Muslims here are becoming more 'radical' or political in their outlook - and I can see their sympathies being used by outside terror interests."

President George W. Bush says he believes that Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda network was involved in the Israeli hotel bombing that killed 13 people, and the simultaneous missile attacks that nearly downed an Israeli charter jet carrying 261 passengers. An Al Qaeda claim of responsibility posted on the Internet is seen as credible.

Thursday, Mr. Bush met with Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi at the White House. They discussed security in the region even as US and Kenyan troops were conducting joint military exercises, named "Operation Edged Mallett," off Kenya's coast.

Kids quoting UN resolutions

These days, Kenyan imams in the mosques preach about injustices done to their brothers in Afghanistan. Most every Muslim teenager on the street is able to recite a litany of Israeli wrongs against Palestinians, and can "prove" that the international media is run by Jews. "CNN is owned by Ted Turner, a Jew," states one misinformed lanky Islamic student in a long white robe. "You might deny. But we know." They argue against the Bush administration's stance on Iraq, easily quoting UN resolutions, past US statements, and oil statistics.

"We, as Muslims, have to support each other's agendas," says Haji Kimani, leaning on a biscuit kiosk outside a mosque in the predominantly Muslim Nairobi neighborhood of Eastleigh. He is waiting for nightfall, when those fasting for Ramadan are allowed to eat again. "We eat together, fast together, and fight together." There is no such thing as a Muslim terrorist, he says. "We are just fighting for our rights against those who would harm us."

These sorts of sentiments are relatively new. Arab merchants and slave traders brought Islam to the coasts of East Africa over 1,000 years ago, setting up schools and mosques, and converting about 10 percent of the total Kenyan population. But for centuries, the Muslims were a quiet community here, keeping to themselves, getting along with their neighbors, staying away from politics.

The turning point

The main turning point, according to Mr. Hassouna, came - as it did elsewhere - at the end of the cold war.

"That is when the divide in the world changed, and turned into a confrontation between the liberal democracies of the West and political Islam," he says. Today, with the help of Internet and satellite TV, along with the arrival of imams from the Gulf and the increase of Kenyan migrant workers traveling around the globe, Muslims here better know, and often empathize with, the needs, hardships, and philosophies of their coreligionists worldwide.***

US faces test to secure E. Africa - The USS Mount Whitney could arrive Friday in Djibouti with an additional 400 US troops. -

*** NAIROBI, KENYA - It's the usual Friday night crowd at the Pavement Club in Nairobi's Westlands: Young expatriates, upper-middle-class locals, a sprinkling of Asians, a few prostitutes. But the Americans with the crew cuts and G-Shock watches sipping energy drinks at the bar stand out.

"We are here to see the wildlife," one explains brightly.

Since the hotel bombing by Al Qaeda that killed 13 people two weeks ago in Mombasa, Kenya is awash with crew-cut types: undercover intelligence agents - both Israeli and American - sorting through evidence, talking to eyewitnesses, trying to find the clues that will lead them to the perpetrators of the attack and their backers.

Four years after the bombing of the US Embassy in Nairobi that killed 219 people, the US has once again been rudely reminded of the danger involved in ignoring Africa. The Bush administration is, therefore, increasing its presence on the continent, strengthening allies to assist in the fight against terrorism. But in a poor region with porous borders, weak or corrupt governments, cheap arms, and an increasingly radical Muslim community, this is no easy task.

"If the US does not plug the terror hole here, however tricky that might be," says Moustafa Hassouna, lecturer at the University of Nairobi's Institute of Diplomacy and International Studies, "then it can only expect more terror from here. It knows it needs to get moving."

The US appears to be getting the message. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld wrapped up a trip through neighboring Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Djibouti this week; the USS Mount Whitney - a floating command post for the new Joint Task Force Horn of Africa, which is to oversee antiterror operations in the region - is en route with 400 troops to Djibouti, where some 800 special forces and several hundred marines are already stationed; and a White House advance team checked into the Nairobi Safari Park Hotel Wednesday, holding schedules showing a tentative presidential visit here on Jan. 16.

Mr. Rumsfeld emphasized that he was not in the region to "engage in transactions," or "put pressure on anybody," but he did indicate the possibility of expanding US military presence in the region. Several African countries here - including both Ethiopia and Eritrea - have reportedly already offered their countries as bases for US troops. In his Washington meeting last week with Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi and Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, President George W. Bush stressed that African allies would be helpful not only in providing bases for the US, but also in sharing information.***

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