AQ has an outpost even in this remote and inhospitable region. In the tradition of Muhammad himself, AQIM relies on kidnapping and brigandage to finance its efforts.
Magharebia: Al Qaeda launches indoctrination campaign along Mali-Mauritania border
By Jemal Oumar for Magharebia in Nouakchott – 05/08/11
Members of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) launched a new push to spread their violent ideology among residents of the Sahel in recent days, as the terror group seeks to recover from successive defeats by Mauritanian and Malian security forces.
Young Mauritanian Sidi Mohamed, a resident of Bassiknou, trades with the villages of northern Mali and has social ties to residents of the region. He told Magharebia that many of his relatives have run into al-Qaeda lectures while trading in Mali, particularly at weekly markets.
“Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb has been organising exhortatory and religious lectures that end with inviting people to engage in holy war, especially the young people,” Mohamed said.
Mohamed added, “The lectures started being organised just before the latest attack of the Mauritanian army. But after the attack of the army on al-Qaeda in the Wagadou Forest, it carried on organising lectures, and what was surprising, is that the lectures were taking place close to the Malian military barracks, and even in front of the Malian gendarmerie at a few meters away sometimes”.
During a telephone conversation with Magharebia, Oumar Ould Brahim said he too witnessed some of the terrorist lectures while working as a trader at the weekly markets along the Malian border.
“All the lectures organised by al-Qaeda were within Malian territory, and specifically in the Tichift Market, where a battalion of six cars was present, while seven other cars kept doing exhibition tours for those who were present,” Ould Brahim said.
“But al-Qaeda members did not have the courage to organise their lectures within the Mauritanian border,” he added.
He also said that in the village of Zweira, 270km from of Bassiknou, “some elements of the armed organisation came at around 9am, and asked the crowd in the market to gather up and listen to the lecture”.
“They were asking people to engage in jihad and read poems for Osama bin Laden, for his jihad in the name of God, and they were asking young Mauritanians ‘Why don’t you give yourself to God and struggle in his name’,” he said, noting that some of the terrorists were carrying camcorders.
“In a Malian village called Laranp, al-Qaeda gave a lecture to the residents and the people visiting the weekly market just 700 metres from the barracks of the Malian gendarmerie, as they were watching the elements of the armed organisation from the balconies of the building,” Ould Brahim said. He suggested it represented a “lack of seriousness” from the Malian authorities in combating al-Qaeda.
[…]
Bechir Ould Babana, a specialist in terrorist groups, said that the AQIM presence in Mali “is no longer a matter of debate because all the residents of those areas are witnesses of it”.
Also see:
- Reuters: Al Qaeda retreats from west Mali camps: military sources
- Magharebia: Mauritanian fighters appear in al-Qaeda video
Al-Qaeda is trying to take advantage of Ramadan to win new recruits after a series of recent defeats in the region.
Note: The previous thread was rescheduled for Monday at 8:00 PM EST.
