Africa-Press – Ethiopia. July 16, 2025 4 minutes read Addis Abeba – Ethiopia’s National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) has announced the arrest of 82 individuals suspected of affiliation with the Somalia-based Islamic State (ISIS) group, in what it said is the most extensive counterterrorism operation targeting ISIS networks inside Ethiopian territory to date.
In a statement issued on Tuesday, 15 July, NISS claimed that the suspects were apprehended across multiple regions, including the capital Addis Abeba, Oromia, Amhara, Harari, Central Ethiopia, and the Somali regional state, as part of a “coordinated operation” conducted with federal police and regional security forces.
Cities and towns targeted in the sweep include Adama, Shashemene, Haromaya, Jimma, Sheger, Bale, Jigjiga, and Harar, among others.
“Extensive surveillance operation”
According to the NISS statement, the arrests followed “an extended surveillance and intelligence operation” that uncovered efforts by ISIS’s Puntland branch to “expand its terror network into Ethiopia and establish sleeper cells.”
“The suspects were attempting to set up logistical and operational cells to coordinate terror attacks, disseminate extremist propaganda, and provide material support to ISIS’s global network,” the agency said.
The intelligence agency further noted that several suspects had “received training in ISIS strongholds in Puntland, Somalia,” and were allegedly tasked with radicalizing vulnerable groups and infiltrating Ethiopian religious institutions to serve as platforms for recruitment and indoctrination.
“Some of the detainees had direct links to ISIS’s international media and financial arms and were actively involved in financing and logistical facilitation,” NISS said, adding that efforts to dismantle the broader network remain ongoing.
During a briefing and explanation session to questions posed by the House of People’s Representatives in April, Field Marshal Birhanu Jula, Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces, claimed that there were Ethiopian “traitors” collaborating with terrorist organizations “enemies of Ethiopia” including ISIS and al-Shabaab. However, the Army Chief was reserved from providing further details.
The announcement coincided with the designation by the U.S.-led Terrorist Financing Targeting Center (TFTC) of three ISIS facilitators operating in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Somalia, and South Africa.
“Today’s joint action underscores our shared commitment to disrupting the ability of ISIS and other terrorist groups to access the international financial system wherever they seek to operate,” said Bradley T. Smith, Acting Under Secretary of the U.S. Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence.
NISS’s alleged assertion echo concerns raised by international analysts about the Puntland faction of ISIS, which has carved out strongholds in the Al-Madow Mountains and remains active despite competing with Al-Shabaab. The group has been implicated in regional smuggling operations and in financing affiliate branches elsewhere in Africa.
On 13 July, the United States Africa Command (AFRICOM) announced it has conducted the latest of a string of an airstrikes targeting ISIS-affiliated militants southeast of Bossaso, a key stronghold in Somalia’s Puntland region. Calling it “a collective self-defense airstrike against ISIS-Somalia”, AFRICOM said the airstrike occurred southeast of Bossaso, Puntland, in Northeastern Somalia.
In June this year, Puntland’s regional government has admitted the presences of ISIS operative in the region. Puntland President Said Abdullahi Deni has claimed that ISIS-linked militants sought to transform the Cal-Miskaad Mountain range in northeastern Somalia into a global coordination center for terrorism, but said the plot was thwarted by Puntland’s security forces.
If NISS’s claims are confirmed, the timing of both actions may indicate the transnational scope of ISIS networks in East Africa and signals heightened counterterrorism coordination among U.S., Somali, and Ethiopian authorities.
But it also marks Ethiopia’s first major admission of ISIS infiltration into its territory and suggests the country may be entering a new phase in its internal and regional counterterrorism strategy.
Parallel threat from Al-Shabaab?
The ISIS infiltration claims by NISS adds a new layer to Ethiopia’s security environment, which in recent years has seen cross-border incursions from Al-Shabaab.
In December 2024, the Federal High Court, Jigjiga Criminal Court Rotating Bench, sentenced 81 individuals to between 12 and 20 years in prison for terrorism-related offenses linked to the Al-Shabaab group.
Court documents presented by the Ministry of Justice’s Organized and Trans-Border Crime Division revealed that the defendants had been actively involved in Al-Shabaab operations since 2019, including carrying out attacks, undergoing militant training, and facilitating recruitment.
The accused were charged under the Ethiopian Criminal Code and the Prevention and Suppression of Terrorism Crimes Proclamation No. 1176/2020. Prosecutors submitted 57 eyewitness testimonies and nearly 400 pages of documentary evidence. The court found several of the defendants guilty based on confessions and corroborated reports of their participation in attacks intended to “instill fear and undermine the state.”
While it remains unclear whether the convicted individuals had any role in Al-Shabaab’s July 2022 incursion into Ethiopian territory, the timeline aligns. That assault by al-Shabaab resulted in the deaths of 17 people, including civilians and Ethiopian police officers, in two Somali border villages. In response, the Ethiopian National Defense Force (ENDF) joined Somali regional security units to repel the militants, killing over 100 Al-Shabaab fighters in a three-day campaign.
In the wake of that incursion, Ethiopia also stepped up its regional security coordination, sending high-level military delegations to Baidoa, Jubaland, Somaliland, and Beledweyne, but not Puntland.
In August 2022, a team led by Major General Tesfaye Ayalew held consultations with Somali National Army commanders and local officials to develop joint counterinsurgency strategies.
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