TIG Post

Tag: Al Qaeda

  • The RFI condemns suspension of broadcasts by the Burkina Faso Junta

    Radio France Internationale (RFI) has condemned the suspension of its broadcasts by Burkina Faso’s military government, calling accusations that it had aided “a desperate manoeuvre of terrorist groups” completely unfounded.

    RFI’s management stated in a press release that the cut-off occurred without prior notice and without following the procedures outlined in the station’s broadcasting agreement with Burkina Faso’s Superior Council of Communication.

    “The France Médias Monde Group will explore all avenues to restore RFI’s broadcasting, and recalls its unwavering commitment to the freedom to inform and to the professional work of its journalists,” the press release said.

    Burkina Faso on Saturday ordered the immediate suspension of Radio France Internationale (RFI) broadcasts, accusing it of putting out a “message of intimidation” attributed to a “terrorist chief”.

    It is the second West African country under military rule, after Mali, to take RFI off the airwaves this year.

    RFI had contributed to “a desperate manoeuvre of terrorist groups” to dissuade thousands of Burkinabe citizens mobilised for the defence of the country, said Burkinabe government spokesman Jean Emmanuel Ouedraogo.

    At the beginning of the week, the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Support Group for Islam and Muslims threatened in a video to attack villages defended by the pro-government VDP militia in Burkina Faso.

    The VDP are civilian volunteers given two weeks’ military training to work alongside the army carrying out surveillance, information-gathering or escort duties.

    The government had already, on November 3, protested the contents of the French broadcaster’s reports, said the government statement.

    “Considering everything that has happened before, the government has decided on the immediate suspension, until further notice, of the broadcasting of Radio France Internationale’s programmes.”

    The government also accused RFI of having relayed “misleading information” suggesting the leader of the Burkinabe junta, Captain Ibrahim Traore, had said there had been an attempted coup against him.

    In Burkina Faso, RFI is broadcast on five FM relays, shortwave, free-to-air on several satellites and via some 50 partner radio stations.

    It is followed each week by more than 40 percent of the population.

     

  • Mali: 150,000 displaced children have no legal identity (NGO)

    The Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) has said that nearly 150,000 children displaced by the conflict in Mali do not have birth certificates and are at risk of exclusion and disenfranchisement because they cannot prove their identity.

    “Thousands of children are excluded from society when they should be in school,” said Maclean Natugasha, NRC’s director for Mali, in a statement released by the NGO to AFP.

    These 148,000 children are among the 422,620 people displaced by the war in Mali, according to August figures from a joint UN and Malian monitoring tool.

    In this country of about 20 million people, 7.5 million people are in need of emergency humanitarian assistance, according to the UN.

    These 148,000 children have either lost their birth certificates when they fled their homes or “never had them because of the limited functioning of civil registry services in some regions”, says the NRC.

    Since 2012, Mali has been in the grip of a security crisis that has left thousands dead and of which civilians are the main victims. The state has only a limited presence in the vast bush where jihadist fighters affiliated to Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State, bandits and traffickers of all kinds, armed militias and politico-military groups that have signed a peace agreement are active.

    If this problem of civil status “is not resolved before these children reach adulthood”, the NRC warns, “they risk being deprived of their freedom of movement, the right to vote and the possibility to own or rent property”.

    Source: African News

  • Bali bombings: Australian families upset over graphic video at ceremony

    At a ceremony commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Bali bombings, graphic footage of the attacks was shown, upsetting survivors and the families of the victims.

    On the Indonesian island late on Wednesday, hundreds gathered to honour the 202 victims of the attacks.

    One victim’s relative said he felt “sick” when the footage aired. It is unclear who made the documentary video.

    The Australian government says it is “deeply disappointed” and will formally raise concerns with Indonesia.

    People from 21 countries – including 88 Australians – died in the bombings at two popular nightclubs in Kuta on 12 October 2002. Another device exploded outside the US consulate but did not cause harm.

    A local group linked to al-Qaeda was blamed for what is Indonesia’s deadliest terror attack.

    A 10-minute documentary-style film was screened at 23:05 local time on Wednesday – marking the moment the first bomb detonated.

    It included footage of dazed and injured people fleeing in the fiery aftermath. There was also audio of people yelling and a clip from the 9/11 terror attacks in New York, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.

    Australian man Jeff Marshall, whose father Bob Marshall died in Kuta’s Sari Club, said he was stunned by the decision to show such “carnage”.

    “[It] just ripped all our hearts apart, seeing it all again,” he told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

    Attendees say the video also included footage of those behind the attack, including convicted bomb-maker Umar Patek, who is currently being considered for early release on parole.

    “We were expecting a minute’s silence once we got to 11:05 pm,” Jan Laczynski told Sydney radio station 2GB.

    “[Instead] you had all the Bali bombers being paraded. You had the actual bomb sequences happening on the screen.”

    Mr Laczynski – who lost five friends in the blasts – said some footage was so “traumatic” that he left the service.

    Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said its government wasn’t involved in organising the event.

    “We understand the distress it has caused,” it said in a statement.

    Indonesian authorities have not responded.

     

  • Ecowas ‘confident’ after meeting Burkina Faso leader

    A West African mission that went to assess Burkina Faso‘s situation following the coup left Ouagadougou “confident” despite gatherings by demonstrators who criticised its visit.

    The delegation on Tuesday met Capt Ibrahim Traoré, the military leader who on Friday overthrew Lt Col Paul-Henri Damiba, who himself came to power in a coup in January.

    They met at the Ouagadougou airport where dozens of demonstrators were calling for more Russian cooperation and chanting anti-France and anti-Ecowas slogans.

    Former Niger president Mahamadou Issoufou, who was part of the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) delegation as a mediator, said they would stand by the Burkinabè people in the very difficult ordeal they were going through.

    Over the weekend he had said the country was “on the brink of collapse”.

    After initially opposing his removal from office, Lt Col Damiba agreed to resign on Sunday and left for Lomé, the capital of Togo.

    The coups have been triggered by worsening insecurity amid frequent jihadist attacks.

    Since 2015, Burkina Faso has been the target of regular attacks by armed groups affiliated with al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group.

    Thousands have died in the attacks and some two million people have been displaced

    Source: BBCAfrica

  • Distinguished Sunni Muslim cleric, Yusuf al-Qaradawi passes away at age 96

    A well-known Egyptian Sunni Muslim cleric, Yusuf Al-Qaradawi,  passed away in Qatar at the age of 96, according to his website.

    Qaradawi founded the International Union of Muslim Scholars and was seen as a spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist movement.

    For many years, he had a religious phone-in show on Al Jazeera TV that was watched by tens of millions.

    Qaradawi’s supporters described him as a moderate, but some Western and Gulf states branded him an extremist.

    He condemned the 9/11 attacks in the United States by jihadist militants from al-Qaeda and backed the pro-democracy uprisings against the leaders of Egypt, Libya and Syria during the Arab Spring.

    But he also called on Muslims to fight Americans in Iraq following the 2003 invasion and claimed that Islam justified Palestinian suicide bomb attacks against Israelis during the second Palestinian intifada that began in 2000.

    In an interview with the BBC in 2004, he said: “I consider this type of martyrdom operation as an indication of the justice of Allah Almighty.”

    Qaradawi’s ties with the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood and his criticism of Egypt’s leaders resulted in him being imprisoned several times in the country before he moved to Qatar in 1961 and began a self-imposed exile.

    He did not return to Egypt until 2011 when a popular uprising ousted long-time President Hosni Mubarak.

    Qaradawi, who had supported the protesters in his TV broadcasts and issued an edict forbidding security personnel from opening fire on them, led Friday prayers for hundreds of thousands of people in Tahrir Square a week after Mubarak’s resignation.

    “Don’t let anyone steal this revolution from you – those hypocrites who will put on a new face that suits them,” he warned the crowd.

    He was forced again into exile in 2013, when the military overthrew Mubarak’s democratically elected successor Mohammed Morsi, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, following mass protests against his rule.

    Qaradawi denounced what he called a “coup” and urged all groups in Egyptian to “restore [Morsi] to his legitimate post”.

    In 2015, a court in Egypt sentenced Qaradawi and dozens of other people to death in absentia over a mass prison break during the 2011 uprising. He dismissed the verdict as “nonsense”.

    The governments of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and the United Arab Emirates also accused Qaradawi of terrorism in 2017 as part of their justification for imposing a de facto blockade on Qatar. The cleric said he rejected terrorism and Qatar refused to extradite him.

  • Suellen Tennyson, kidnapped US Catholic nun freed in Burkina Faso

    The US Catholic nun who was abducted by armed men in April in Burkina Faso has been released, according to the local bishop of Kaya, in the country’s north-east.

    “Sister Suellen is currently in a safe place and in good health,” Bishop Theophile Nare said in a statement.

    Suellen Tennyson, 83, was taken hostage from a local parish in the middle of the night, leaving behind her glasses and blood pressure medication.

    The identity of the kidnappers is not known.

    However, several militant groups have carried out attacks in Burkina Faso.

    Bishop Nare said he did not have any information on the circumstances leading to Sister Suellen’s release. The FBI had put out a missing person notice after the kidnapping.

    Several militant groups allied to al-Qaeda and Islamic State operate in the Sahel region and are known to carry out attacks and kidnappings against civilians in Burkina Faso and neighbouring countries.

    Regional nations continue to launch several offensive operations against the militant groups.

  • Al-Qaeda chief in north Africa Abdelmalek Droukdel killed – France

    France says it has killed the leader of al-Qaeda in north Africa, Abdelmalek Droukdel, in an operation in Mali.

    Defence Minister Florence Parly said Droukdel along with members of his inner circle had been killed in the north of the country on Wednesday.

    French forces had also captured a senior Islamic State group commander in Mali in an operation in May, she said.

    The “daring operations” had dealt “severe blows to the terrorist groups”, she said.

    “Our forces, in co-operation with their partners in the Sahel, will continue to hunt them relentlessly,” she said.

    What is the context?

    As head of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), Droukdel was in charge of all affiliates in north Africa and also commanded al-Qaeda’s Sahel affiliate, Jamaat Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM).

    The captured Islamic State group commander, Mohamed Mrabat, was a veteran jihadist and had a senior role in the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) group, Ms Parly said. He was caught on 19 May, she added.

     

    On 7 May IS revealed its militants had been engaged in fierce clashes with al-Qaeda in Mali and Burkina Faso. It accused JNIM of attacking its positions, blocking fuel supplies and detaining IS supporters.

    ISGS has quickly established a foothold in the Sahel countries after announcing a presence in March last year.

    Who was Abdelmalik Droukdel?

    Aged in his late 40s, Droukdel fought against Soviet troops in Afghanistan, and was thought to regard the former leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, as his inspiration.

    Under his leadership AQIM carried out numerous deadly attacks, including a 2016 assault on a hotel in the Burkina Faso capital Ouagadougou that left 30 dead and 150 injured.

    In 2012 he was sentenced to death by a court in Algeria after being convicted in absentia of murder, membership of a terrorist organisation and attacks using explosives.

    The charges related to three bomb attacks in the capital Algiers in April 2007 which killed 22 people and wounded more than 200 others.

    Presentational grey line

    A veteran jihadist

    This veteran Algerian jihadist was one of the most notorious commanders in the north Africa-Sahara region, waging violent campaigns first in Algeria then later against French and other forces in Mali.

    According to the UN Security Council, which sanctioned him in 2007, Droukdel was an explosives expert who built devices that killed hundreds of civilians in public places. As leader of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) he was instrumental in the kidnap of both local and western nationals in attacks as far apart as Tunisia, Niger and Mali.

    He also helped the group expand its area of activities deep into Mali where, according to the French government, he met his end.

    Jihadist groups are usually quick to announce a successor to killed or captured leaders but in north Africa there are signs of increasing tension between al-Qaeda and its more recent rival, Islamic State and its affiliates.

    Presentational grey line

    What is France doing in the Sahel?

    Thousands of French troops have been deployed in Mali since 2013.

    France, the former colonial power, became involved after Islamist militants overran parts of the north. With French help, Mali’s army has recaptured the territory, but insecurity continues and violence has spread to neighbouring countries.

    More than 5,000 French troops have been serving as part of Operation Barkhane in support of the forces of Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Burkina Faso and Chad.

    However they face a growing insurgency by jihadist groups, which have significantly stepped up their attacks in the Sahel countries since last year.

     

    Source: BBC