SOMALIA — Somalia’s National Intelligence and Security Agency (NISA) said on October 6 that its forces, working with international partners it did not name, killed Bashir Ahmed Haji Nunow in a planned operation on the night of Thursday, October 1, in Jilib district.
NISA said Nunow was the former head of the arm al-Shabaab calls Amniyaadka, the group’s internal security and intelligence wing, a post it said he held from 2016 to 2024. In that release NISA calls al-Shabaab the Khawaarij.
The agency said he also used the aliases Geescadde, Fanax, Gardhuub and Ali Dheere, and that he had a major role in planning attacks on Somali civilians, naming the October 14, 2017 bombing at the Soobe junction in Mogadishu, the Ex-Control Afgooye attack, the Soobe 2 attack, and other attacks at hotels and places on Lido beach in Mogadishu.
Location
Jilib district, Middle Juba, southern Somalia: town center at approximately 0.49, 42.77, a published geographic position for the town, not a point NISA released for the operation. U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), in its August 7 strike entry for the vicinity of Jilib, placed that place 200 miles (322 km) southwest of Mogadishu. The district is a recurring area in AFRICOM’s public strike list. NISA gave no street, compound or coordinate for the October 1 operation.
