About 5,000 Sufi fighters join Somali Government Army

For 10 years, Sufi fighters have fought al-Shabab and managed to retake the group's strongholds in the windswept plains of central Somalia.

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In central Somalia, about 5,000 Sufi fighters are signing up to join the national army.

In a surprise move two months ago, the group decided to have its fighters integrated. So far, they are the only local group to go up against al-Shabab fighters and win.

Sufism is a mystical branch of Islam and has been widely practiced in Somalia before the advent of Salafism in the country following the civil war that broke out in 1991.