N1bn Bounty Still On Shekau -- US

The United States is still maintaining the $7 million (N1.4 billion)
bounty it placed on the leader of the Islamic sect, Boko Haram.

The US Department of State on Wednesday issued a list of 71
most-wanted terrorists in the world with bounties totalling $375m
(N74.6bn) as "rewards for information that leads to (their) arrest or
conviction."

Rewards for Justice, a State Department's anti-terrorism programme,
had first offered the amount as a reward to persons with information
on the whereabouts of the Boko Haram leader in June 2013.

The President Barack Obama-led administration, in the fresh list,
placed a whopping $25 million, the single largest bounty, on Ayman
al-Zawahiri, suspected to be one of the doctors and advisors to Osama
bin Laden, the late leader of al-Qaeda.

Al-Zawahiri is suspected to have played a role in bombing of the US
embassy in 1998.

Four Islamic State terrorists appeared on the list with a total of $20
million bounty on them.

They were Abd al-Rahman Mustafa al-Qaduli ($7 million); IS's official
spokesman, Abu Mohammed al-Adnani ($5 million); Tarkhan Tayumurazovich
Batirashvili alias 'Omar the Chechen' ($5 million); and Tariq
Bin-al-Tahar Bin al Falih al-'Awni al-Harzi ($3 million).

A senior leader of the IS, Abu Du'a alias Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi; and
al-Zawahiri's deputy and self-proclaimed leader of al-Qaeda in the
Arabian Peninsula, Nasir al-Wahishi, and four others had $10 million
bounty placed on each of them.

Shekau was among the three with $7 million bounty. Others were a
senior leader of al-Qaeda in Iran, Muhsin al-Fadhli; and Abd al-Rahman
Mustafa al-Qaduli.

Forty six terrorists had $5 million placed on each of them. They
include a founder of Harakat Shabaab al-Mujahidin and a senior leader
in al-Shabaab, Ibrahim Haji Jama; an expert in chemical weapons and
explosives in al-Qaeda, Ali Sayyid Muhamed Mustafa al-Bakri; and the
Operational Commander of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Othman
al-Ghamdi.

Eleven terrorists, including only two women on the list, have a $3
million on each of them. The women, Zerrin Sari and Seher Demir Sen,
are members of a Turkish military/political party and the terrorist
group, Revolutionary People's Liberation Party/Front.

The second in command of a radical Ahl-e-Hadith Islamist organisation,
Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, Hafiz Abdul Rahman Makki; and an explosives expert
in the Hezb-e Islami Gulbuddin group, Abdullah Nowbahar, have a $2
million bounty on each of them.

With a $1 million bounty each were a senior leader of the Abu Sayyaf
group based in Philippines, Radullan Sahiron; and an explosives expert
in the Abu Sayyaf and the Jemaah Islamiyah terrorist organisations,
both in the Philippines, Abdul Basit Usman.
--PUNCH