The terror chief was wanted by America for allegedly planning in the US embassy truck bombings in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in 1998 which killed 224 people.

Kenya's police chief confirmed Abdullah was killed on Wednesday - confirming a report from Somali Islamist Shebab rebels.

"We have received that communication from authorities in Somalia," Kenyan Police Commissioner Mathew Iteere said.

"We have been told that there were two terrorists who were killed in Somalia on Wednesday last week."

Officials with the Somali Transitional Government (TFG) said the terrorist pair were killed at a roadblock on the outskirts of Mogadishu after "they refused to stop".

The men were travelling in a pick-up truck carrying medicine, laptops and mobile phones.

Abdullah: Wanted by the US over embassy bombings

A Somali security source said the pair appeared to have taken the wrong turning and ended up in an area under TFG control.

A source close to the investigation said the man identified as Abdullah was carrying a South African passport in the name of Daniel Robinson.

The passport, issued April 13, 2009, indicated that its bearer left South Africa for Tanzania on March 19 and was granted a visa there.

Abdullah was also said to have been in possession of $40,000 (£24,600) in cash.

His body has been given to US officials for identification.

Abdullah, who was born in the Comoros islands, joined al Qaeda in 1991.

From 2002 he was put in charge of al Qaeda's operations in the whole of east Africa.

That same year he planned anti-Israeli attacks in Mombasa that left 15 dead.

In January 2007, he survived a US raid that left dozens of people dead at Ras Kamboni in southern Somalia.


Sky News

The low pressure area in Eastern Arabian sea has now intestified into a depression.

According to a new report from Oxfam, a broken food system and environmental crisis are now reversing decades of progress in the fight against global hunger. Oxfam projects that spiraling food prices will create millions of hungry people unless we radically transform the way we grow and share food. Starting June 1 st, Oxfam will launch a global campaign. It is called GROW.

In the report published today, Oxfam identifies the various symptoms of our broken food system: growing hunger, flat lining crop yields, lack of fertile soil and water, and rising food crisis. The organization says that we have entered a new age of crisis where depletion of the earth’s natural resources and increasingly severe climate change impacts will create millions more hungry people. Naturally, poor countries will be affected dramatically more than industrialized nations. Oxfam projects that the price of staple food such as maize, already at an all time high, will more than double in the next 20 years. Half of this price increase will be directly linked to climate change. The world’s poorest people, who spend 80 percent of their income on food, will be hit in the harshest way.

By 2050, Oxfam predicts that demand for food will rise by 70 percent. Yet our capacity to increase food production is in decline. The average growth rate in agricultural yield has declined by almost 50 percent since 1990, and it is set to decline even further in the coming decade. Oxfam’s GROW campaign will expose government failure which are propping up the broken food system and the group of 300 to 500 companies who benefit from it. Four global companies control the movement of the world’s food. Three corporations- Archer Daniels Midland, Bunge and Cargill- control around 90 percent of the global grain trade. Their speculative activities drive volatile food prices and they profit from it. For example, in the first quarter of 2008, at the top of a global food crisis, Cargill’s profits were up by 86 percent. In 2011, Cargill is heading for its most profitable year on record. Needless to say, this speculation on food prices will further disrupt global food supplies.

“For too long governments have put the interests of big businesses and powerful elites above the interest of the seven billion of us who produce and consume the food. The G20 must invest in the 500 million small scale farms in developing countries which offer the greatest potential for increasing global yields-and they must help them adapt to a changing climate. They must regulate commodity markets and reform flawed biofuel policies to keep food prices in check,” said Jeremy Hobbs, the Executive Director of Oxfam.

To read the full Oxfam report click here.