IntelBrief: Al-Shabaab Shows No Signs of Decline in East Africa

Bottom Line Up Front

• The government of Somalia announced that 43 al-Shabaab fighters, including two high-level commanders, were killed in an airstrike by the Somali National Army (SNA) in the Lower Juba region on June 19th.
• On June 13th Marine Corps General Michael Langley, head of the United States Africa Command, visited Mogadishu to meet President Hassan Sheik Mohamud of Somalia, Somali defense and state department leadership, and African Union Transmission Mission in Somalia (ATMIS) troops.
• Despite facing ATMIS ground forces from Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, al-Shabaab is actively conducting terrorist activities, with varying success, across the border into neighboring Ethiopia as retribution for stationing their troops within Somalia.
• Al-Shabaab has increased its presence and activities in eastern Kenya, with confirmed attacks over the last month causing the deaths of over 30 Kenyan soldiers, police officers, and civilians.