A Nigerian court has sentenced the presumed leader of the Ansaru jihadist group, Mahmud Muhammad Usman, to 15 years in prison for what local media on Thursday termed “illegal mining activities”.
Nigerian authorities announced the capture of Usman and fellow Ansuru leader Mahmud al-Nigeri in mid-August.
Usman pleaded guilty to the mining charge — the activity having allowed him to procure firearms for attacks by his group, Nigerian media reported.
He also faces 31 other charges, including acts of terrorism and kidnapping, for which he faces an October trial.
Ansaru grew out of a 2021 split within the Boko Haram group, and the group then allied itself with al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).
The United States designated Ansaru and Boko Haram as “foreign terrorist organisations” in 2013.
After the split, the group established itself in Kano, Nigeria’s second-largest city, with a population of nearly five million in the northern state of the same name.
Usman is also known as Abu Bara and al-Nigeri as Mallam Mamuda.
They are understood to have also been involved in several high-profile kidnappings in central and northwest regions and to have organised several armed robberies, using the tactics to “finance terrorism” over several years, according to the Nigerian presidency in August.
In a July 2022 attack, jihadists used firearms and explosives to enter Kuje prison, a medium-security facility located outside the capital, Abuja.
Several hundred prisoners were released before police recaptured them.
Ansaru later claimed responsibility for the attack.
The group has also been accused of blowing up railway tracks and attacking a train travelling from the capital, Abuja, to the northwestern city of Kaduna, also in 2022.
Eight people were killed, and dozens more were kidnapped and held hostage for some months.
Back in 2012, the group attacked a police station in the capital, killing police officers and freeing detainees. The United States says Ansaru also kidnapped and executed seven foreign construction workers in 2013.
