Stewart Bell in Somalia.

Stewart Bell, National Post

MOGADISHU, January 16, 2007—Volunteer fighters from Canada who traveled to Somalia to participate in what they thought was a holy war were killed during fighting that erupted three weeks ago, Somalia’s Deputy Prime Minister said yesterday.

Hussein Aideed said in an interview that Canadian citizens of Somali origin were among the hundreds of Islamist fighters killed on the battlefield since a Dec. 24 offensive by troops loyal to interim President Abdillahi Yusuf Ahmed.

The Somali-Canadians had returned to their ancestral homeland to take up arms in support of the Islamic Courts Union, a Taliban-like group with suspected links to al-Qaeda that controlled much of southern Somalia until it was ousted in late December.

“A lot of them died,” said Mr. Aideed.

Asked again to confirm that Somali-Canadian fighters had been killed, he said: “Yes because they believe in dying. They did not fight as tactical fighters. They fought to death.”

The interim transitional government that has swept into power in recent weeks in this lawless and heavily-armed nation has long claimed its rival the Islamic Courts was made up partly of foreign Muslim fighters — much as Afghanistan was a magnet for jihadists from around the world under Taliban rule.

Canada has one of the world’s largest Somali communities, and the National Post revealed last fall that Somali-Canadians had returned to Mogadishu to join the Islamic Courts. Among them is former Toronto resident Abdillahi Ali Afrah, a senior leader of the Islamist group.

The Department of Foreign Affairs said yesterday it had not been informed of any Canadians killed in Somalia in recent weeks, but Kenya has said it captured at least one suspected fighter with a Canadian passport trying to flee Somalia.

The Islamic Courts abandoned Mogadishu when pro-government troops, backed by Ethiopia, advanced but Mr. Aideed said some of the wounded foreign fighters are still in the city. He said they will be arrested eventually, but police are in no hurry since they cannot escape.

The foreigners come from a broad array of countries, including Pakistan, Yemen and Kenya, he said. “They are from the U.S., they are from Canada, passport holders. They are from Australia, who joined what they call quote-unquote the brotherhood of Islamic jihad.”

Many young fighters recruited into the Islamic Courts militias were killed in two battles near Baidoa. Two thousand may have been killed there, mowed down by shelling, said Information Minister Ali Ahmed Jama.

“They were dying like flies, it was incredible,” he said.

Others were killed in the south, where the U.S. carried out air strikes two weeks ago in an attempt to kill suspects wanted for their alleged roles in the 1998 bombings of two American embassies in East Africa.

Mr. Jama, himself a former Ottawa resident, said Canadians may have been among the dead, but he had heard no details or names.

“Its possible because many young people came from all over the world,” he said. “I’m certain there are a few who joined what they call the jihad. They were sending them to their deaths.”

Since it captured Mogadishu last June, the Islamic Courts leadership has portrayed itself as engaged in a holy war. The group has gained mounting interest among extremists who incite youths, including al-Qaeda’s second-in-command Ayman Al-Zawahiri.

Aside from getting fighters from abroad, the Islamists were also receiving guns, according to a U.N. monitoring group that reported last year that the Islamic Courts was being armed, trained and funded by seven states, including Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Libya and Eritrea.

“Mo” Abdillahi Mohamed, a Somali-Canadian who now serves as personal secretary to Deputy Prime Minister Aideed, said a Toronto mosque had been recruiting youths to join the Islamic Courts.

The mosque is affiliated with Al Ittihad Al Islami, an al-Qaeda-linked Somali terrorist group headed by Sheikh Hassan Aweys, leader of the Islamic Courts shura council, he said.

Mr. Mohamed said that in Mogadishu last fall, he met a youth he had known in Toronto, who told him he had come to Somalia to learn the language but had decided to join the Islamic Courts.

“I saw him and he said, ‘We are, just in this camp, 12 Canadians,’” said Mr. Mohamed, adding the acquaintance mentioned they were being trained for operations abroad.

Mr. Mohamed said he called the Canadian High Commission in Nairobi and warned an official that Somali-Canadians were not only in the Islamist shabab militia, but were also being groomed for overseas terrorism.

“There are a lot of Somali westerners, from Canada, the U.S., a lot of young Canadians are here that are being brainwashed to fight. Mostly they are in the shabab, the young Canadians.”

Two Somalis were among 18 men arrested in Toronto last June for allegedly belonging to a “homegrown” terrorist group plotting bomb and shooting attacks in Canada, but they are not suspected of having trained in Somalia.

Source: National Post