DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) – The president of Somalia, a country plagued by violence from Islamic militants, said Tuesday that al-Qaida and the Islamic State group constitute the same “evil force” and must be confronted in the wake of the attacks on Paris.
President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud knows the danger extremist groups pose. He himself has been targeted for assassination by the al-Qaida-linked group al-Shabab, which continues to carry out attacks in his arid Horn of Africa nation.
Mohamud stressed the need for Western countries to embrace both military and economic measures to derail extremists. He acknowledged that some al-Shabab militants have pledged their loyalty to the Islamic State group.
“At the end, the result is the same: It is an evil force that’s there for destruction, whether they’ve got the name al-Qaida or Daesh,” Mohamud told The Associated Press, using an alternate Arabic acronym for the extremist group.
“They’re just rebranding, nothing more than rebranding,” he continued. “Their actions, their ideologies are all the same – (though) maybe one is more brutal than the other.”