The United States (US) government has said its suspicions that the Nigerian Taliban has links with Al Qaeda affiliates led by Osama bin Laden and the Mali arm of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Magreb (AQIM) are yet to be proved by conclusive evidence.
Also, the US said the widespread poverty in Muslim dominated North could be a breeding ground for radicalism in spite of the view expressed by Sultan of Sokoto, Sa�ad Abubakar III, that there is no �Al Qaeda cell of Taliban in Nigeria.�
The US government made its views known in its 2007 Country Reports on Terrorism released in Washington, D.C yesterday.
According to the report, �the Nigerian Taliban (which has no connection to the Taliban of Afghanistan) has been suspected of having connections to AQIM in Mali and AQ affiliates. To date, no conclusive links have been definitely proven, although bin Laden went on record in 2003 saying that Nigeria was fertile ground for action.
�The Sultan of Sokoto, the supreme Muslim authority in the country has stated �there is no AQ cell of Taliban in Nigeria.� The Sultan received information from a longstanding network of traditional local and regional leaders (emirs) and maintained that it would be extremely difficult for terrorist groups to operate without the detection by this network.�
It said arrests of extremists in Nigeria suggests to some degree there may be cooperation between extremist groups in the Sahel made possible by easy movement through porous borders and the logistical difficulties of patrolling the Sahara desert.
It mentioned an April 2007 attack on a police station in Panshekera, a village outside Kano that was allegedly perpetrated by the Nigerian Taliban but was not proven.
It said the identities and affiliations of the attackers were still unknown.
It said its Trans-Sahara Counter terrorism Partnership (TSCTP) set up to enhance the capacity of governments in the pan-Sahel, comprising Mauritania, Mali, Chad and Niger as well as Nigeria and Senegal are to tackle the challenge of terrorist organisations in the trans-Sahara.
It is also meant to facilitate cooperation between those countries and the Maghreb nations that include Morroco, Algeria and Tunisia, it stated.
�In December 2006, Mohammed Yusuf, a Maiduguri-based Imam and alleged �Nigerian Taliban� leader was charged with five counts of illegally receiving foreign currency. His trial was still ongoing at the end of 2007.
�Also in December, 2006, Mohammed Ashafa of Kano was charged with receiving funds in 2004 from two AQ operatives based in Lahore, Pakistan to �identify and carry out terrorist attacks� on American residences in Nigeria.
�Deported from Pakistan for alleged ties to AQ and said to have undergone terrorist training in Mauritania, Ashafa was charged in a Nigerian court with recruiting 21 fighters who went to camp Agwan in Niger for terrorist training with AQIM.
�Ashafa also stood accused of being a courier for AQ from 2003 to 2004 who passed coded messages from Pakistan to Nigerian Taliban members on how to carry out terrorist activities against American interests in Nigeria.
�In addition, Nigerian authorities alleged that Ashafa�s home was used as an AQ safe house and that he rendered logistical and intelligence support to AQ operatives.�
Sultan Sa�ad Abubakar had visited Washington, D.C. in November last year on the invitation of the United States Institute of Peace (USIP), an organisation funded by the US Congress.
He spoke on Muslim-Christian relations in Nigeria. Abubakar�s visit was co-sponsored by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and the African Programme at Johns Hopkins University.
He also made a stop at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), where he delivered a paper entitled �Islam and Democracy in Nigeria�.
It is believed the US government sought his cooperation in tackling their concerns in the Northern part of the country.