Unholy Alliance? Assessing the Links between Organised Criminals and Terrorists in Southern Africa

This paper explores whether similar links can be substantiated in Southern Africa. In doing so, definitional, theoretical and methodological problems around the concepts of terrorism and organised crime are highlighted. Seven case studies are examined, of which four deal with instances of ‘international terrorism’. These are the United States (US) embassy bombings in the Tanzanian capital, Dar es Salaam, and the Kenyan capital of Nairobi, the implications of the gemstone tanzanite for terrorist financing, the terror attacks in the Kenyan port of Mombassa and the case of Mohamed Suleman Vaid, an alleged South African intermediary between terrorists and organised criminals.