Sources: Son of Boko Haram Founder Arrested in Chad
A young son of Boko Haram’s founder has been arrested in Chad, where he was allegedly leading a jihadist cell, intelligence sources and a former insurgent revealed.
Muslim Mohammed Yusuf was arrested with five other suspected members of the group. Boko Haram was founded in Nigeria years before his birth by his father, radical preacher Mohammed Yusuf.
For nearly 15 years, the Islamist group has terrorised communities around the Lake Chad region, launching attacks on villages and military bases.
Chadian police confirmed the arrest of six Boko Haram members but did not specify whether one of them was the late Yusuf’s son.
A Nigerian intelligence officer in the region told AFP that the six-man cell, led by Muslim Yusuf, actually belonged to the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) a rival faction that split from Boko Haram. He noted Yusuf was an infant when his father was killed in 2009 during a military crackdown that left about 800 people dead, putting his age now at 18.
Photos from the arrest showed a young, slender man in a blue tracksuit resembling Yusuf, standing beside older suspects. He is said to go by the alias Abdrahman Mahamat Abdoulaye and is the younger brother of ISWAP leader Habib Yusuf (Abu Mus’ab Al-Barnawi).
A former Boko Haram lieutenant, now a critic of the group, also confirmed Yusuf’s arrest by Chadian forces.
Chadian police spokesman Paul Manga told AFP the suspects were “bandits who operate in the city” and described them as undocumented Boko Haram members, adding that the arrests occurred “a few months ago.”
Nigeria’s counter-terrorism centre and intelligence service have yet to comment on the development.
