US offers rewards for information about African militants

, June 14: The US has offered rewards for those who will give information about four African

, media reported.

The US State Department offered rewards of $5 million each on Khalid al-Barnawi, leader of the Nigeria-based terrorist group Ansaru, Hamad el-Khairy and Ahmed el-Tilemsi, both founding members of a terrorist group named Movement for Unity and Jihad in Africa, Xinhua reported.

Another bounty of $3 million was offered for Abu-Yusuf al-Muhajir, an explosives expert and a former member of Tawhid w'al Jihad-Egypt. The department said Muhajir was involved in plotting attacks against the US.

The agency said al-Barnawi, also a former senior member of the Nigeria-based Boko Haram terrorist organisation, was involved in Ansaru's kidnapping of a British and an Italian engineer in May 2011, who were both killed 10 months later.

The department listed al-Barnawi as a specially designated global terrorist in June 2012.

As former members of Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, Khairy planned terrorist operations against Mauritania and was involved in the December 2008 abduction of UN envoy and Canadian Ambassador Robert Fowler in Niger, while Tilemsi played a role in the January 2011 kidnapping of two French nationals in Niger, the department said.

Both were put on the US terrorists list in December 2012.

IANS