US targets suspect in Somali raid

US forces have “likely killed” a top al-Qaeda suspect during a US military raid in Somalia, a US official has told the BBC.

The suspect, Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, is wanted over 2002 attacks on a hotel and an Israeli airliner in the Kenyan port of Mombassa.

He has been on the FBI’s list of top suspects years.

The claim followed earlier reports that foreign troops had attacked Islamist militants in southern Somalia.

Earlier reports said the troops wore uniforms with French insignia, and had attacked a vehicle carrying Islamists from the al-Shabab group.

A French military spokesman denied his country’s forces were involved.

The reason for the confusion over the identity of the troops was not immediately clear.

Witnesses said the soldiers took away two men, and two bodies were left in the road after the attack in the southern coastal town of Barawe.

Spanish news agency Efe and Reuters also reported witnesses and al-Shabab sources as saying the Kenyan-born Nabhan had been killed.

Nabhan is suspected of bombing of an Israeli-owned hotel in Kenya and attempting to shoot down an airliner in 2002, as well as two attacks on US embassies in the region in 1998.

Somalia has not had a functioning central government since 1991.

Rival Islamist factions are battling forces loyal to the weak UN-backed government, which controls only small parts of the capital Mogadishu.