Kenya arrests wanted US wildlife smuggling suspect

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Kenya arrests wanted US wildlife smuggling suspect

4:12 CAT | 03 Aug 2022

Image: Twitter / @DCI_Kenya

Kenyan police have arrested a suspect linked to a transnational drug and wildlife trafficking syndicate and who had been indicted in a US court with three others.

Kenyan police said detectives from its Serious Crimes Unit on Tuesday arrested Abdi Hussein Ahmed, alias Abu Khadi, in the central Meru county following a tip off from the public.

Mr Ahmed was charged in 2019 in a court in the Southern District of New York with conspiracy to traffic rhinoceros horns and elephant species worth $7m (£5.7m) and intent to traffic a kilogramme of cocaine.

He was indicted jointly with Moazu Kromah aka Ayoub, Amara Cherif aka Bamba Issiaka, and Mansur Mohamed Surur aka Mansour.

They had reportedly conspired to smuggle the horns and ivory from Kenya, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Guinea, Mozambique, Senegal and Tanzania.

The arrest comes after US Embassy chargé d’affaires Eric Kneedler and the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) director general, George Kinoti, made a public plea on 26 May for information that could lead to Mr Ahmed’s arrest.

Mr Ahmed’s alleged accomplice, Badru Abdul Aziz Saleh, was arrested a week after the plea.

The DCI said the arrest of Mr Ahmed and Mr Saleh pointed “to the longstanding partnership that the directorate has had with the United States in combating trans-national organised crimes in the world”.

It shared a statement about the arrest on Twitter:

SECOND FUGITIVE ON MOST WANTED LIST OF U.S & KENYAN AUTHORITIES ARRESTED

Detectives drawn from the Serious Crimes unit have today arrested Abdi Hussein Ahmed alias Abu Khadi, a suspect wanted in the United States, for wildlife and drug trafficking. pic.twitter.com/zlBg6Sh9vp

— DCI KENYA (@DCI_Kenya) August 2, 2022