UPDATE: The FBI's Minneapolis Office has confirmed the identity of one of two suicide bombers involved in the attack on a Somali Transitional Federal Government (TFG) military checkpoint in Mogadishu on May 30th as Farah Mohamed Beledi.
Somali forces killed a Canadian al-Shabaab fighter Wednesday in a gun fight that ensued after he and other man refused to obey orders to stop at a military checkpoint in the capital of Mogadishu.
A source from the Somali-Canadian community told the National Post that a cell phone found on the body contained text messages and call logs reflecting contact with family in Toronto. A Somali army official said that a Canadian passport on the body identified the man as Muhan Jeans.
Jeans, reported a Somali radio station, is known as "Abdurrahman the Canadian" and is said to be an al-Shabaab commander in charge of the Juba region, near the Kenyan border.
Canadian security authorities are currently investigating the disappearance of 20 Canadians thought to have traveled to Somalia to join the al-Qaida linked militant Islamist group. In March, Canadian police arrested 25-year-old Mohamed Hersi at a Toronto airport before he left for Somalia and charged him with plotting to join al-Shabaab.
Al-Shabaab is well-known for its ability to recruit Western youth to fight the Somali transitional government for its ultimate goal of installing a pan-Islamic state in Somalia.
Like Canada, the U.S. has also opened investigations into the disappearance of Somali youth-primarily out of Minnesota. One Minnesota man, indicted in absentia by the U.S. last year, was reported to have died while trying to execute an al-Shabaab suicide bomb attack in Mogadishu last week.
Family members identified 27-year-old Farah Beledi in a photo from the scene of the attack which killed three, including one government solider. The Star Tribune reports that Beledi is believed to have left Minnesota shortly before he was indicted with seven others on terrorism-related charges. Abdullahi Ahmed, also from Minnesota, was initially identified as the perpetrator of the attack.
The FBI has not yet confirmed the identity of the bomber. It is unclear whether the initial reports were incorrect or if both men were killed in the attack. A Minnesota Public Radio report noted that while Beledi died before he successfully activated his bombs, African Union officials say another man successfully detonated his.