The United States previously said that the strike inside Somalia had targeted Godane, but did not know whether he had been killed.
“We have confirmed that Ahmed Godane, the co-founder of al-Shabaab, has been killed,” said rear admiral John Kirby, the Pentagon press secretary, describing it as a “major symbolic and operational loss” for the militant group, which aligned itself with al-Qaida.
Al-Shabaab is fighting to topple Somalia’s western-backed government and regularly launches bombings and gun attacks against state targets and civilians. Godane’s death could now lead to an internal power struggle.
On Wednesday US officials had said they were still investigating to see whether the strike on an al-Shabaab encampment had killed Godane, 37, who reportedly trained with the Taliban in Afghanistan.
At least three strikes hit a convoy of al-Shabaab vehicles in southern Somalia on Monday night, according to witnesses and a spokesman for the group who spoke later with the Associated Press. The al-Shabaab representative said that six al-Shabaab fighters had been killed in the strikes.
The air raid came days after African Union (AU) troops and Somali government forces launched “Operation Indian Ocean”, a major offensive aimed at seizing key ports from al-Shabaab and cutting off one of their key sources of revenue: multi-million dollar exports of charcoal. AU forces were targeting Shabaab on several fronts, with Ugandan troops leading the offensives against the main port of Barawe, south of the capital, Mogadishu.
The commander of the AU in Somalia has said the death of Godane would be a “proud and happy moment for all Africa”.
Godane, who has a passion for poetry, seized world attention a year ago with the Westgate mall attack in Nairobi, which left at least 67 dead. He warned Kenya that it would suffer further atrocities unless it withdrew its troops from the AU force in Somalia.
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