Source: BBC News
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8077725.stm
Since they began to capture large swathes of southern Somalia, radical Islamists have been undertaking a programme of destroying mosques and the graves of revered religious leaders from the Sufi branch of Islam.
The destruction of non-approved religious sites started last year when they began to knock down an old colonial era church in the town of Kismayo.
Most Somalis are Sufi Muslims, who do not share the strict Saudi Arabian-inspired Wahhabi interpretation of Islam with the hardline al-Shabab group.
They embrace music, dancing and meditation and are appalled at the desecration of the graves.
But al-Shabab sees things differently.
The group's spokesman in the town of Kismayo, Sheikh Hassan Yaquub, told the BBC Somali Service that his movement considered that the memorials were being worshipped and that this was idolatry - banned by Islam.
"The destruction of graves is not something new: we target graves that are overdecorated and ones used for misleading people.