*TW: This episode contains discussions of extrajudicial killing that some listeners may find distressing*
During a deadly dawn raid by a Kenyan paramilitary squad, an innocent Muslim man, Omar Faraj, was brutally murdered. In this episode Namir Shabibi sets out to find those responsible for this extrajudicial killing. The paramilitary squad is, we discover, part of America’s post-9/11 covert War on Terror infrastructure. Following the death squad from Mombasa’s Muslim neighbourhoods to the ‘secret’ Recce military complex miles away in rural Ruiru all the way to the CIA’s headquarters in Virginia, we hear how it was developed, funded, equipped and supported by the United States. Across conversations with former Kenyan parliamentarians, ex-American security forces personnel, academic experts and local activists, including the Chair of ‘Muslims for Human Rights,’ Khelef Khalifa, Shabibi exposes the global War on Terror’s brutal underbelly: a project designed to evade accountability, while terrorising Muslim populations in Kenya and beyond.*
*This episode first aired in 2024.
**This episode was executively produced by Maia Holtermann Entwistle and Sharri Plonski. Surviving Society Productions co-produced, hosted and recorded episodes. Sound mixing and design by Surviving Society creative director George “Adders” Ofori-Addo. Interview with Surviving Society’s executive producer and host, Chantelle Lewis.**
Useful Links:
Center for Constitutional Rights (USA): www.ccrjustice.org
Muslims for Human Rights (Kenya): www.facebook.com/UTETEZI
UNREDACTED (UK): www.unredacted.uk
Further Reading:
William Daugherty. Executive Secrets: Covert Action and the Presidency (Lexington: Kentucky UP, 2004).
Loch K. Johnson. The Third Option: Covert Action and American Foreign Policy (Oxford: Oxford UP, 2022).
Namir Shabibi. “Revealed: The CIA and MI6’s secret war in Kenya,” Declassified UK, 28 August 2020, https://declassifieduk.org/revealed-the-cia-and-mi6s-secret-war-in-kenya/.
Namir Shabibi & Jack Watling. “Britain’s Covert War in Yemen: A VICE News Investigation,” 7 April 2016, https://www.vice.com/en/article/8x3enb/britains-covert-war-in-yemen-a-vice-news-investigation.
This episode was supported by the Leverhulme Trust and Queen Mary University of London.
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