“We categorically refute and reject the allegations of compatibility in the illegal charcoal trade in Somalia”, she said, adding that allegations were aimed at ridiculing the force.
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“The connection between Al-Shabaab and sugar smuggling came to the fore in Kenya during the group’s current mandate – this implied KDF involvement by describing how sugar enters Kenya via Kismayu”, the report said. But United Nations and other experts have said the trade continued after that through the southern Somali port Kismayu, where Kenyan forces have a base. The Jubaland administration allegedly levies a tax of $2 per bag on imported sugar, an income of around $250,000 a week or $13 million annually.
It accuses Kenyan troops of widespread human rights abuses including airstrikes, missing targets and hitting civilians and livestock as well as allegations of rape and disappearance.
“Port tax on charcoal alone gave the KDF network (and al-Shabaab) Sh100 million ($1million) to Sh200 million ($2 million) per month, or between Sh1”. 4 billion ($24 million) a year.
Kenyan army spokesman, Colonel Obonyo, said, “We are not involved in sugar or charcoal business”.
“How can you sit down with Shabaab one minute, and the next you are killing each other?”, which suggests that the profiteering could be a rogue operation, rather than institutional.
The group was behind the 2013 attack on the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi, Kenya, in which about 60 people were killed, as well as the assault on Garrissa University College in Kenya earlier this year, which killed a few 150 people. It said the network enjoys the protection and tacit cooperation of leaders at the highest echelons of the executive and parliament.
Al Shabaab ruled Somalia for several years until 2011, when its forces were driven out of the capital Mogadishu by African Union troops. “The hideouts have already been destroyed and the weapons handed to the government”. “(The) Somalia authority themselves appreciate that there are so many makeshift ports that are unpoliced”, said Col Obonyo.
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Even away from the smuggling racket, the global funding that participating armies receive for their effort makes for good living for their soldiers and a substantial financial boost for their military institutions.
