Al-Qaeda's leader Ayman al-Zawahri said Somalia's militant group al Shabaab had joined the global network, according to the SITE online monitoring service.
"Today, I have glad tidings for the Muslim ummah (nation) that will please the believers and disturb the disbelievers, which is the joining of the Shabaab al-Mujahideen Movement in Somalia to Qaedat al-Jihad, to support the jihadi unity against the Zionist-Crusader campaign and their assistants amongst the treacherous agent rulers," SITE quoted Ayman al-Zawahri as saying.
In June, Al Shabaab pledged allegiance to Ayman al-Zawahri after he was named al-Qaeda leader, following the killing of Osama bin Laden in a US attack in Pakistan.
Al Shabaab, which controls large areas of Somalia, pulled out of the capital Mogadishu in 2011 but still poses an almost daily threat.
