News USA US sanctions four members of an Islamic State cell in South Africa

US sanctions four members of an Islamic State cell in South Africa

Archive – Johannesburg Street – CHEN CHENG / XINHUA NEWS / CONTACTOPHOTO – Archive

The Treasury Department announced Friday new sanctions against four members of an Islamic State cell in South Africa and eight of their companies for providing technical, financial or material support to the terrorist group.

“The Treasury Department is targeting key individuals in the Islamic State network in South Africa, as well as its business assets, who have played a critical role in enabling terrorism and other criminal activity in the region,” he said in a statement. Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian Nelson.

Those sanctioned — including the brothers Nufael Akbar and Yunus Mohamad Akbar, as well as Mohamad Akbar and Umar Akbar — are part of an Islamic State cell based in Durban, South Africa, led by Farhad Hoomer.

While Nufael Akbar is a central command figure in the cell, his brother Yunus is its logistics coordinator. For their part, both Mohamad Akbar and Umar Akbar were arrested in 2018 by South African authorities along with Hoomer for their part in a plot to deploy improvised incendiary devices near a mosque and commercial buildings.

These sanctions come almost two weeks after the US Embassy in the country warned of a risk of a terrorist attack in Sandton, north of Johannesburg, without providing further information.

“The United States Government has received information that terrorists may be planning to carry out an attack against large concentrations of people in an unspecified location in the Sandton area,” read the alert issued by the US legation.

Johannesburg has not suffered a major attack in recent decades, although the country is under threat from the Islamic State group, which has warned of possible attacks in retaliation for South African involvement in anti-terror operations in northern Mozambique.

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