Somalia government officials in Gedo region in the southwest confirmed that they arrested Zakariya Ismail Ahmed Hersi, a top Al-Shabaab Amniyat (Intelligence) commander who has a US bounty of three million US dollars on his head.

Zakariye was among the seven Al-Shabaab members on a US list of wanted terrorists and with a sum of 33 million dollars.

Mohamed Abdi Kalil, the governor of Gedo, told the local media that Hersi defected from Al-Shabaab and had negotiation with the Somalia government, but he was arrested before negotiations facilitated him to surrender to the force.

But a member of the Somali security forces in Elwak, who was among the forces that raided house in Elwak and arrested Hersi, confirmed that they had never received any information related to the negotiations between the government and Hersi. Instead, they got the information that an Al-Shabaab commander entered the town and hides himself.

The Lieutenant, who requested anonymity as he was not assigned to give any statement to the media, said "our intelligence in the town got the information that a senior Al-Shabaab commander entered the town and plans to launch series of violent attacks. We carefully monitored the house he was in and finally launched a raid and arrested him."

"He surrendered when we fell into his house. We found about 10 different mobile phones and a pistol from him and his special assistant was with him when we arrested him," the Lieutenant added.

Hersi, who was the commander of Al-Shabaab's suicide and intelligence unit locally called Shuhadada, was also the deputy commander of Al-Shabaab's Amniyat commander Mahad Karatey, whose leadership of Al-Shabaab Amniyat let violent attacks in Somalia and attacks targeted to a restaurant in Kampala in 2012 and Nairobi's Westgate Mall, which claimed 67 lives in 2013.

A short statement from Somalia's National Intelligence and Security Agency (NISA) confirmed that Hersi is in the hands of the NISA forces in Elwak and will be transferred to Mogadishu for interrogations.

Al-shabaab responded to the news about the capture of Zakariye Hersi by denying his link with the group.

A statement from Al-Shabaab information office, which was read on Al-Shabaab's Al-Andalus radio, insisted that Hersi joined Al- Shabaab one time, but defected from the group 19 months ago and his surrender to the government doesn't mean any importance for Al- Shabaab.

Hersi's arrest came 48 hours after Al-Shabaab infiltrators launched an attack in Halane AMISOM base camp, which killed three AMISOM soldiers, a civilian and eight Al-Shabaab attackers.

Al-Shabaab called the infiltration of Halane base camp was a revenge to the killing of Al-Shabaab founder and leader Ahmed Abdi Godane, aka Mukhtar Abu Zubeyr, who was killed 4 months ago by a U. S. guided missile targeted to his convoy.