•After his arrest, the Congolese government, through Interpol Counter terrorism border operations, approved Mohammed’s trial for the murder of the soldier.
•The suspect came into the limelight in January 2022 when a video of the killing of a Congolese soldier using a machete surfaced online.
Image: Handout
A court in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) sentenced Kenyan terror suspect Salim Mohammed, alias Chotora or Turki Salim to death.
His lawyer Yusuf Ababukar said in Kenya he was sentenced to death by hanging after undergoing trial for the murder of a Congolese soldier in March.
The lawyer said he had requested the Congolese government to supply his family with the judgment to enable them to appeal the sentence.
The trial began in November last year and in March, a verdict was released by the Congolese Judiciary, and he was sentenced to hang after he was found guilty of murder, he said.
After his arrest, the Congolese government, through Interpol Counter-Terrorism Border operations, approved Mohammed’s trial for the murder of the soldier.
Prior to his trial, anti-terror police detectives drawn from Mombasa and Nairobi, alongside officers from the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI), had traveled to Congo to interrogate and record statements from Mohammed to establish his terror links, networks and connections within East Africa, West Africa and Syria.
Kenya had sought to have Mohammed extradited to enable the authorities to gather more details and information in relation to his terrorism activities and his accomplices who are at large and further charge him locally.
The suspect came into the limelight in January 2022 when a video of the killing of a Congolese soldier using a machete surfaced online.
During his arrest in Congo in January 2022, he was fighting for the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF) which has been in operation since 1996 and is responsible for hundreds of deaths of civilians and soldiers in Uganda and DRC.
Mohamed had been arrested by anti-terror police in June 2019 at the Moi International Airport, Mombasa while trying to flee the country.
He was facing charges of being in possession of terrorist materials in the Ngomeni area in Kwale county.
He was arrested by the Congolese army on suspicion he was part of the Allied Democratic Forces rebel group that has been conducting raids in northern DRC near the border with Uganda.
Mohamed is a Mombasa resident and a suspected terrorist on whose head Kenya had placed a Sh10 million bounty.
The suspect had also joined the Islamic State Central Africa Province (ISCAP).
Several Kenyan youths from the Masjid Musa Mosque were last seen in the Goma and Butembo cities in DRC after getting temporary unofficial jobs as truckers.
According to officials, Mohamed recruited the youths and planned their logistics to DRC by getting them temporary jobs as turn boys for trucks destined for the second largest country in Africa.
Freight forwarding companies owned by some Yemeni businessmen are often allegedly exploited during such terrorist operations.
Police say he was released on bond in 2020 over terrorism charges before he went missing.
Mohamed, who was linked to various criminal activities in Mombasa, is believed to have joined the Islamic State in Mozambique at the time.
In a video, Salim can be seen explaining to DRC residents that he and two other associates were en route to South Africa in the hopes of starting over.
Mohamed, 29, jumped bail in 2021 in a terror-related case. His family says they do not know his whereabouts.
His friends, neighbours and former schoolmates were shocked after seeing him in an undated video beheading an alleged Isis traitor.
He was sent to Turkey to study computer engineering after scoring an A-minus in the 2014 KCSE but was later deported. Mohamed fled to Mozambique to join the Isis and later sneaked to DRC.
He was described in a probation report as an intelligent man who has wasted his chances in life and chosen to engage in a dangerous trade.
Mohamed went to Qubaa Nursery in Mvita and later joined Qubaa Primary School, before being transferred to Abu Hureira Academy, where he sat the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education exam in 2010 and passed.
He joined a private secondary school in Mombasa in 2011 and sat his KCSE exam four years later, emerging as one of the top candidates.
Mohamed was selected to join the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology but was not interested.
He was later enrolled at the Technical University of Mombasa to study computer engineering but dropped out after the first year.
He later enrolled in a certificate course in computer studies at Abraar Muslim School, after which he went for computer engineering studies at Istanbul Kultur University in Turkey.
He was deported from Turkey on suspicion of being a member of Isis after being found at the border headed to Syria.
He was charged with the offence at Shanzu Law Court in 2017 but was acquitted for lack of evidence.
In 2019, he was arrested at the Moi International Airport over terror links and charged in court.
He was accused, together with others not before the court, of being a member of the al Shabaab terror group.
Mohamed was also charged with being in possession of items used to make improvised explosive devices.
This was after he was found with twin stranded wires, batteries connected in a series using a piece of carton secured by an elastic string, inductor coils, black particles and white explosive powder used in the making of improvised explosive devices.
Police said he was found with the materials on March 8, 2019, at Ngomeni in Kwale county.
After spending days in remand, the suspect secured a Sh1.5 million bond with one surety of a similar amount after Mombasa senior resident magistrate Rita Amwayi said the prosecution did not have valid reasons to have him kept in custody pending the conclusion of his case.
He later vanished, and his disappearance was reported to the police in December 2020.
By then, at least eight witnesses had given evidence in the case, and an arrest warrant was issued.
Police later arrested one Richard Lazarus Kivatsi, who had been communicating with Mohamed, and another suspect, Alfan Ali Juma, who was said to be in Mozambique.
According to the police, the two escaped to Mozambique after the court granted them bond.