Target Removal of Diplomatic Vehicles and Fake Taxis and

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Replying to the video, Eske se vre yo pa pran $1,50 la ankò sou lajan transfè Haiti yo, Target Removal of Diplomatic Vehicles and Fake Taxis and Ubers., Sept. 1, 2016. Mumin was targeted in an airstrike late last month, according to U.S. officials.

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WASHINGTON --
The United States is sharpening its counterterrorism focus on Somalia, going after increasingly high-profile targets linked to a resurgence of the Islamic State terror group from its base in the Horn of Africa.

U.S. officials are concerned that IS-Somalia, as the terror group's regional affiliate is known, has moved from being a key cog in the Islamic State global financial network to hosting the group's top leader.

Top IS leaders "view Africa as a place where they should invest, where they are more permissive and able to operate better and more freely, and they want to expand," according to a senior U.S. defense official.

"So, they did bring the caliph to that region."

"The caliph provides strategic direction, which we view as allowing them to develop and expand, even more so than we would expect," the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity in order to discuss intelligence matters.

The U.S. assessment follows a flood of rumors emanating from Somalia that the IS emir, Abu Hafs al-Hashemi al-Qurashi, traveled from Syria or Iraq and then through Yemen to the semi-autonomous Puntland region of Somalia in country's northeast.

It also follows warnings from multiple Somali security officials that IS-Somalia has grown stronger, due in part to an influx of fighters and operatives from Yemen.

As evidence of the magnified U.S. focus on IS in Somalia, a second U.S. official confirmed to VOA on Monday that an airstrike late last month in the vicinity of Dhaadaar, 81 kilometers southeast of the city of Bosaso, targeted IS-Somalia leader Abdulqadir Mumin.

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