BULAHAWA, Somalia — Muslim extremists seeking evidence that a Somali man had converted from Islam to Christianity shot him dead Aug. 18 near the Somali border with Kenya, according to underground Christians in the war-torn nation.
Al Shabaab rebels killed 41-year-old Ahmed Matan in Bulahawa, Somalia, according to Abdikadir Abdi Ismael, a former leader of a secret Christian fellowship in Somalia to which Matan belonged. Matan had been a member of the underground church since 2001.
The early morning shooting comes at a time when Islamist groups led by al Shabaab are hunting down converts to Christianity as they seek to establish Shariah throughout Somalia.
Ismael, who fled the area in 2005, said he received a telephone call from Matan two weeks prior to his death in which the convert told him that monitoring by the Islamic extremists kept him from leaving his home and carrying out his small-trade business across the border.
“I am afraid for my life — the al Shabaab want to get a proof that I follow the Christian faith,” Matan told Ismael. “They have not been seeing me in the mosque and seem to have realized that I am not part of them.”
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