A senior United States counterterrorism official has claimed that American forces recovered the largest cache of terrorist electronic materials since the 11 September 2001 attacks during a recent counterterrorism operation against Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) in North-east, Nigeria.
The 2011 attack is considered by many to be the largest terror attack on the US and has largely shaped US counter-terrorism policy.
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The US Deputy Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Counterterrorism at the National Security Council, Sebastian Gorka, made the disclosure in a video record of an interview with Marissa Streit, chief executive officer (CEO) of PragerU, while highlighting what he described as major successes in the Trump administration’s counterterrorism campaign.
PraherU is an American nonprofit media organisation that produces conservative educational and opinion content.
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According to Mr Gorka, the operation resulted in the killing of 199 jihadists and the seizure of an unprecedented volume of intelligence materials.
“I watched our operators kill 199 jihadis in one operation,” Mr Gorka said. “That is the biggest neutralisation of enemy killed in action since September the 11th—199 jihadists who will not harm Americans again.”
He said the intelligence recovered from the operation was even more significant.
“From that raid, we needed an extra plane to bring home all the electronic material that we captured in those camps,” Mr Gorka said. “The haul was three times bigger than any enemy electronics haul since 9/11.”
He added that US intelligence experts were already examining the materials for valuable information.
Although Mr Gorka did not identify the operation by name, his description corresponds with the joint Nigeria-United States raid announced in May that eliminated Abu-Bilal al-Minuki, also known as Abubakar Mainok, a top commander of Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP).
US President Donald Trump announced the joint operation that led to his killing. His Nigeria counterpart, Bola Tinubu, confirmed the operation, saying Mr Mainok and several of his lieutenants were killed during a strike on his compound in the Lake Chad Basin, specifically near Metele in Borno State.
Following that operation, Nigeria’s Defence Headquarters (DHQ) said 175 terrorists were killed during the offensive, explaining that Mr Mainok and several of his key lieutenants were among those neutralised.
The operation, according to Nigerian authorities, was the culmination of months of intelligence gathering and precision planning.
Mr Gorka’s figure of 199 jihadists killed is higher than the casualty figure released by the DHQ. Neither the US nor Nigerian authorities have publicly explained the discrepancy since the US counterterrorism official made his remarks.
His comments also provide the first public indication from a senior US official of the scale of intelligence recovered during the raid, suggesting that the electronic devices seized could offer significant insights into the operations, communications and financing of jihadist networks in the Lake Chad region. The Nigerian government has not spoken on the statement of the US official and why it allowed the US to take custody of the seized materials.
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Also, last week, the United States government sanctioned Mukhtar Muhammad, a Lagos-based Bureau De Change (BDC) operator, and three firms allegedly controlled by him over claims that they served as financial conduits for ISWAP. The Nigerian government later sanctioned the same entities and others for similar reasons.
It is not immediately clear whether the sanctions were linked to the intelligence recovered during the May operation that killed ISWAP commander Mr Mainok, or stemmed from a separate US counterterrorism investigation.
As of the time of filing this report, neither the White House nor the Nigerian government had publicly released further details of the operation.
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