In a major enforcement sweep conducted from July to September 2025, the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) and the African Union Mechanism for Police Cooperation (AFRIPOL) announced that 11 alleged senior members of terrorist organisations in Nigeria were among 83 individuals arrested across six African countries.
• The operation, code-named Operation Catalyst, ran between July and September 2025 and targeted networks suspected of financing terrorism, including through cyber-enabled fraud, money-laundering and virtual asset misuse.
• Participating countries included Nigeria, Angola, Cameroon, Kenya, Namibia and South Sudan.
• In total, 83 arrests were made. Authorities also identified around 160 persons of interest.
• More than 15,000 individuals and entities were screened during the operation.
• Investigators uncovered roughly USD 260 million in a mixture of fiat currency and virtual assets that might be linked to terrorist-financing networks.
• So far around USD 600,000 has been seized, with further asset-tracing efforts still ongoing.
• The arrests in Nigeria included reportedly “high-level members of several terrorist groups”.
• In Kenya, investigators dismantled a virtual-asset laundering network worth approximately USD 430,000 and arrested two suspects. They also uncovered a case of online recruitment of youths into terrorist groups via cryptocurrency trading platforms.
• In Angola, about 25 suspects were arrested in connection with informal value-transfer systems used for money-laundering and suspected terrorist-financing. Authorities seized around USD 588,000, along with 100 mobile phones and 40 computers, and froze 60 bank accounts.
• A cryptocurrency-based Ponzi scheme affecting at least 17 countries (including Nigeria) was also revealed in the sweep. It is alleged to have defrauded victims of around USD 562 million and to have been used at least in part to channel funds to terrorist networks.
INTERPOL Secretary General Valdecy Urquiza described the operation as “the first time financial crime, cybercrime and counter-terrorism units from multiple African countries have joined forces … By sharing intelligence, expertise and resources, we can more effectively disrupt the financial flows that support terrorist activities and keep our communities safe.”
AFRIPOL Executive Director Jalel Chelba said the joint effort “illustrates how coordinated action between Member States can address complex and evolving security threats.”
This operation signals a shift in the fight against terrorism on the African continent — from simply targeting fighters to going upstream and disrupting how terrorist organisations are financed. By focusing on cyber-enabled scams, virtual assets, fraud and money-laundering, the authorities are closing off increasingly sophisticated routes which extremist networks rely on. The fact that the investigation uncovered hundreds of millions of dollars in suspicious flows underscores the scale of the challenge.
The Nigerian arrests stand out because they involved senior suspected operatives — an indication that law-enforcement agencies may be reaching deeper into the command-and-control structures of militant groups rather than only targeting low-level foot soldiers.
While the arrests are significant, the relatively modest seizures (USD 600,000) compared to the USD 260 million identified indicate that much of the illicit funds remain untraced or unrecovered. Further long-term investigations will be required, especially given the cross-border nature of the networks and the use of virtual assets.
As African countries, in collaboration with global bodies like INTERPOL, increasingly target the financial lifelines of terrorism, it is expected that more operations of this kind — requiring sustained intelligence-sharing, capacity-building and cooperation with the private sector (particularly crypto-exchanges and fintech firms) to follow the money effectively.
