Sahara: One dead, one alive?

There were reports in the French media at the end of April, notably in AFP, that Haroune Said, a former colonel in the Mali army who had deserted and become Iyad Ag Ghali’s right hand man, had been killed in a French military operation north of Kidal on 24–25 April.

Although Colonel Gilles Jaron, speaking for the French General Staff, did not confirm that the dead jihadist was Said, sources in the Mali military and the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) both told AFP that it was. For a short while, there were also ill-founded rumours that Iyad himself had been killed. These may have stemmed from unverified reports on local social media some two weeks earlier that intimated as much.

Authoritative local sources are fairly certain, however, that Iyad, now wanted as a designated international terrorist, is being sheltered by the authorities in Algeria. It is widely believed that he is being housed just across the border in Tin Zaouatene, although his presence has also been reported in Tamanrasset. Confirmation was also received this month from a former high-ranking US intelligence officer responsible for the sector that Iyad was being sheltered by Algeria.

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.
© 2014 Menas Associates

 

Sahara: Chinese fined for environmental violation

Following a recent strike by China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) workers, the Chad government announced on 21 March the imposition of a US$1.2 billion fine against the Chinese oil company for repeated environmental damage.

In a tough call, Environment Minister Mahamat Issa Halikimi said, ‘As a result of non-compliance with its obligations and repeated violations of environmental standards … the government requires CNPC International to repair the damage and pay a fine of US$1.2 billion.'

This is a remarkable, and some might say welcome turnaround by a government that, only a decade or so ago, was complicit in allowing appallingly sloppy environmental practices at the Doba oil fields, not to mention dangerous environmental safety shortcuts made for financial reasons in the construction of the Chad–Cameroon pipeline.

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.
© 2014 Menas Associates

Sahara: IEA on North Africa

 

The International Energy Agency (IEA) medium-term outlook report, published on 28 May, anticipates that oil production from OPEC members Algeria, Angola, Libya, and Nigeria will stagnate over the next five years at 7.12 million b/d, posting more or less zero growth from 2012 to 2018. Last year, the agency anticipated supply growth of 685,000 b/d from 2011 to 2017.

 

Antoine Halff , head of markets at the IEA in Paris, said that at first the Arab Spring of 2011 looked like a blip as production recovered quickly from the war in Libya. 'But it turns out it is a big event,' he said. 'We are beginning to see security issues in northern and western Africa and this will have implications for OPEC supply.' Although oil production recovered from the Arab Spring faster than expected, the delayed impact of the revolutions that swept across North Africa is now hurting supply growth forecasts for Libya, Algeria, and Nigeria.

 

The IEA is particularly bearish about Algeria, forecasting a drop in oil production capacity from last year's 1.2 million b/d to 0.8 million b/d by 2018. The other African members of OPEC will see their production capacity stagnate instead of posting significant growth, as the IEA forecast only a year ago. This gloomy outlook comes on the back of escalating security risks, uncompetitive fiscal terms, challenging local content requirements, and contract sanctity concerns. The IEA concludes, 'Increased violence by Islamist extremists and militants, against a backdrop of political instability across much of northern and western Africa since the Arab spring, is changing the equation for acceptable risks for international oil companies.'

 

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

© 2013 Menas Associates

Mali: Prime Minister Diarra ashamed at interim leader's beating

In a TV broadcast, Mali's Prime Minister Cheick Modibo Diarra said he is ashamed that the country's interim President Dioncounda Traore was beaten unconscious by protesters on Monday 21st May.

Traore was attacked a day after a deal was made with coup leader Capt Amadou Sanogo for Traore to remain in office for a year.

In the same televised address, Diarra appealed for calm and called for the protests to stop. A spokesman for regional bloc ECOWAS said Mali could face sanctions if the military was in any way involved.

There has been speculation that soldiers allowed demonstrators, who backed the coup leaders, into Traore's office. He was reportedly unconscious when he reached the hospital, but was later released.

It is thought that the protesters were furious that Traore's decree, which was due to end on Monday, was prolonged. The recent political upheaval in the country and the rebel seizure of northern Mali, have seen thousands of people flee their homes.

Human rights groups are concerned about the humanitarian situation in the country, which is also currently undergoing a draught.

Speaking about the incident Diarra said: "I am ashamed to relate what happened this morning. I'm asking the young people who protested today not to protest again. I have understood their complaints and I'll make sure that the right people hear about them. Given the situation that this country is in right now, vandalism and looting is not what we need. It's not going to help the reconstruction of the nation."

ECOWAS representatives left Bamako on Monday, saying "we have accomplished our mission". The bloc's spokesman Sunny Ugoh, however, told the BBC he was shaken at the events that followed their departure and said sanctions were now a possibility.

He added: "We're rather shocked that this kind of incident would happen barely 24 hours after a delegation from ECOWAS managed to secure an agreement with the military. I believe that regional governments are already consulting to see how they can respond to the situation. Sanctions are still on the table if it turns out that those with whom an agreement was reached are complicit in this."

Sources: BBC News, Reuters, AFP

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

Mali's former president Toumani in Senegal's embassy

In a joint press conference in Paris with France's President Nicolas Sarkozy, Senegal's President Macky Sall said Mali's ousted leader is in the country at the Senegalese embassy. He noted: “President Amadou Toumani Toure [is] at this moment on the territory of the residence of the embassy of Senegal in Bamako."

Until recently, Toure's whereabouts since last month's military coup were unknown. The news of his whereabouts follows the arrest of several of his political allies this week.

Toure formally resigned on April 8, as part of a deal for the soldiers to hand back power. Mali's former prime minister Modi Sidibe was picked up by men in military police cars and reportedly taken to Kati, just outside the capital, Bamako, to the headquarters of the rebel soldiers. Reports later emerged that Defence Minister Sadio Gassama and the man responsible for the former president's personal security chief of staff Gen Hamidou Sissoko are also being detained by the military.

Speaking about the latest developments in Mali, Sall said: “This is a troubling situation." He added that West African leaders were "trying to find a rapid and peaceful solution first of all internally so we can return to the normal constitutional regime and then deal with the partition of Mali."

Since the coup, Tuareg and Islamist militants have taken over the majority of the northern desert region. The former have declared independence for the region, a move resisted by the civilian and military authorities as well as Islamist elements.

Sources: Reuters, AP, BBC News

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

Algerian troops in Mali

The linkage of the alleged Aguelhok executions to Al-Qa'ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and the DRS raises two significant questions:

What was the Algerian army doing in Aguelhok?
Was the West complicit?
Troops on the move

Algerian armed forces crossed into Mali on 20 December. While the Algerian government eventually admitted that 15 military instructors had been sent to Mali, local observers reported an Algerian army convoy of five army trucks with trailers and 24 heavily armed 4x4s heading south on the Bordj Mokhtar–Tessalit– Aguelhok road. The number of troops was not given but can be assumed at around 200.

The same sources confirmed Algerian troops were garrisoned at the army bases in both Tessalit and Aguelhok. In addition, an army transport was seen flying into Kidal. It contained an unspecified number of Algerian army officers and was reportedly heavily armed. What were these troops doing in Aguelhok and had they been withdrawn to Algeria by the time of the alleged executions? The official reason given by Algeria for its troop presence was to help Mali combat AQIM. That was untrue, however, as no attacks have been launched at any time against AQIM in Mali by either Malian or Algerian forces.

All the signs are that the Algerian army wasn't here to protect AQIM from any assault on it by the MNLA, which has threatened to rid Mali of AQIM. As the MNLA has stated, AQIM is a cover for the billion-dollar cocaine trafficking industry, which is controlled by elements of the political-military elites and their security services in both Mali and Algeria. While the MNLA's secessionist demands may be a threat to Mali's sovereignty, the most serious threat is to the continued presence of AQIM in Mali and the lucrative state-run cocaine business. Indeed, if Mali were not such a close client state of Washington, it is likely that it would already have been labelled a narco-state.

Western complicity?

The second question concerns the matter of complicity. The line of reasoning is as follows. If Abdelhamid Abou Zaïd and AQIM were involved in executions at Aguelhok, the DRS is implicated and its allies and backers, namely the United States and the United Kingdom, may also be deemed complicit. Both US and UK intelligence services are aware of the DRSled AQIM training camp in the Tassili-n-Ajjer. Thus, if Malian soldiers were executed at Aguelhok by AQIM, the people who undertook the executions were under or closely associated with Abou Zaïd's command and almost certainly trained in such methods at the DRS-managed AQIM training camp. If an international enquiry were to establish such a chain, then how far could Western allies of the DRS be held accountable? That question makes a full investigation of what took place at Aguelhok unlikely.

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

© 2012 Menas Associates

New Saharan provinces in Mali

On 16th December, the Malian government announced that it was going ahead with the plan to create two new provinces in the northern desert regions of Taoudéni and Ménaka. Taoudéni is currently part of the Timbuktu region and Ménaka part of Gao.

This move is in accordance with the intention to increase the number of provinces from eight to 19 over five years. While justified as part of the state's decentralisation programme, the creation of these two new provinces in particular is also an attempt to improve the security of the country's northern region. The move will inject more administration into these largely ignored regions, as well as new military commands.

While the proposal appears to be welcomed by some sectors of the population, notably the Arab community of Timbuktu, it is receiving mixed initial views from the Tuareg population. While some see it as a genuine move towards decentralisation, others are wary that it will establish greater restrictions, especially militarily, over the predominantly Tuareg regions. The schedule for these new regions coming into practice is not yet established.

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

© 2012 Menas Associates

China on state visit to South Sudan

China's Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi is on a state visit to South Sudan, a first for the newly independent country. Yang met with President Salva Kiir in Juba, to discuss South Sudan's future.

Speaking to the press after the meeting, Yang said: “There's a bright future for China and South Sudan and for our relationship. So I wish the Sudanese people every success."

He added: "Our two economies are there for each other and we want to see good co-operation in such areas like agriculture, infrastructure construction, oil production."

Earlier this week, Yang held talks with Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir. China has always had strong ties with Sudan's president, despite claims of war crimes in Darfur.

South Sudan's Foreign Minister Deng Alor said Yang's visit would "set in motion a special relationship between the People's Republic of China and the Republic of South Sudan".

Alor added: “As a newly independent nation we definitely need a country like China to help us in development of our infrastructure, of our agriculture, vocational system and many areas."

Meanwhile, Sudan's Foreign Minister Ali Ahmed Karti has announced that Sudan has granted China more oil exploration rights, following Yang's meeting with Bashir Monday 8th August.

He said: "President Bashir has granted the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) three promising new petroleum blocs and offered a partnership with the national petroleum company Sudapet in the fields where it operates.”

Sources: BBC News, Reuters, AFP

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

Niger: Issoufou to face Oumarou in a run-off

The head of Niger's electoral commission, Abdourahamane Ghousmane, said Mahamadou Issoufou was leading in the presidential race with 36 per cent of the vote. He also said Issoufou is to face former prime minister, Seini Oumarou, in a run-off neither of the candidates received a majority vote.

Oumarou, a close ally of former president Mamadou Tandja, ousted by the army in 2010, is backed by a broad coalition, including the party of the third-placed candidate, Hama Amadou. Niger's military ruler Salou Djibo promised to hand power to an elected leader before April.

Last October, a new constitution was passed in a referendum, reducing the powers of future presidents and limiting them to two terms in office. The election results are expected to return uranium-rich Niger to civil rule.

Sources: BBC News, The Canadian Press, AFP

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

Southern Sudan referendum results indicate secession

Polling officials have said that partial results of the Southern Sudan's referendum indicate that 99 per cent of the people voted for independence from the north. The results, published on Friday 21st January, are only partially complete with several hundred thousand votes yet to be counted to account for the 96 per cent turnout estimate. The final results will be announced next month.

A spokesman for the Southern Sudan Referendum Bureau, Aleu Garang Aleu, said: "Some few counties still remain to submit their results, so the figures are not complete yet, and we are continuing to work hard to finalise the results…We are still expecting that the results for the south will be released on January 31, and, allowing time for any appeals, the final result will be announced in Khartoum on 14th February."

According to the rules, stipulated in the 2005 peace treaty between the north and the south, for the referendum to be valid more than 50 per cent of voters must back secession, and at least 60 per cent of registered voters must take part in the referendum.

So far, the Southern Sudan Referendum Commission has counted 3,197,038 ballots which revealed that 98.6 per cent of the people voted in favour of secession. In the state of Jonglei, an overwhelming 99.93 per cent of votes were in favour of secession, with a mere 77 voters supporting Sudan's unity. The preliminary results from the state of Western Equatoria also showed that 99.5 per cent of voters backed independence.

Sources: BBC News, AfricaAsia, Reuters, Voice of America

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

Southern Sudan takes to the polls for the second day amid reports of violence

It has been reported that at least 36 people have been killed in Sudan's Abeyi region in the clashes between tribes-people and the ethnic Arab Misseriya. A spokesman for the administration of central Abyei region, Charles Abyei, said members of the Misseriya began attacking the village of Make on Friday 7th January.

Abyei's Dinka Ngok tribe, in the south, also accused Khartoum of enabling the clashes by arming the Misseriya with weapons and added that they were expecting more attacks in the coming days.

In trying to counteract the accusations of initiating the attacks, Misseriya's leader, Mokhtar Babo Nimr, said it was the southerners who started the fighting, leaving 13 of his men dead.

"They attacked us because they don't want the Arabs to go south to water their herds. But the cattle need water and they will go. If they continue to stop us going south this fighting will continue," he said.

Reports of violence emerged as thousands of south Sudanese gathered in from of the polling stations for the second day of voting in the historic independence referendum. The vote, expected to divide Africa's largest country, has evoked both violence and joy as Southern Sudan's President Salve Kiir couldn't hold back the tears when the southern Sudanese took to the polls in the regional capital of Juba, on Sunday 9th January.

Experts says that the central region of Abyei is most likely to undergo biggest outbreaks of violence during and after the referendum, due to a troubled peace deal which ended decades of civil war.

Sources: The Daily Telegraph, Radio Netherlands Worldwide, Reuters

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

Sudan needs a more transparent oil sharing deal

A new report published by Global Witness has called on Sudan for more transparent oil revenue disclosures in order to avoid conflict ahead of Sunday's [9th January] referendum on southern independence.

The report stated that with the upcoming “referendum on independence for southern Sudan just days away, oil sector transparency is now more important than ever to preserving the fragile peace between north and south."

The UK based resource lobbyist says that the unclear distribution of oil wealth has contributed greatly to the mounting tensions between northern and southern Sudan. Most of the country's oil comes from the south but the infrastructure remains in the north.

The current oil revenue sharing deal between the two regions indicates a 50:50 distribution, but Global Witness says the two sides need to come to a more transparent and effective agreement to replace the existing one that expires at the end of January.

"There has been much mistrust over whether the current revenue distribution system has been implemented fairly. Mistrust over revenue sharing was one of the primary reasons for the south's temporary pullout from the power-sharing arrangement in 2007. Evidence suggests that such concerns are not unfounded," the report said.

The upcoming referendum is part of the 2005 treaty that ended a two decade war between the north and the south. It is estimated that over 95 per cent of registered voters live in southern Sudan, while the remainder are in the north or abroad.

"With both sides hugely reliant on oil revenues from the south, this issue is paramount going into the referendum… so the single best way to ensure stability after the referendum is to put a transparent and verifiable new oil deal in place," added the report.

Sources: BBC News, CNN, FT, Bloomberg

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

President Omar Al-Bashir says Islamic laws to be enforced if South-Sudan splits

Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir has said that if South-Sudan decides on independence in next month's referendum, the country will reinforce its Islamic laws. He said that constitution would also be altered, to make Islam the only religion, Sharia the only law and Arabic the official language within the region.

"If south Sudan secedes, we'll change the constitution. There will be no question of cultural or ethnic diversity. Sharia will be the only source of the constitution, and Arabic the only official language," said al-Bashir on national television.

It is expected that al-Bashir's assertion may cause moral panic among thousands of non-Muslim southerners living in the north of the country. Previous attempts to impose Sharia laws on non-Muslim southerners resulted in civil war, which ended when a peace treaty was penned in 2005.

The treaty stipulated the upcoming referendum and an agreement between the north and the south for an interim constitution that considered both Islamic and Christian social and cultural values. Subsequently, Arabic and English were recognized as the official languages within Sudan and will remain so until July 2011.

And official from Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) Yasir Arman said that Bashir's comments are likely to cause repression in the north.

“This type of discourse is preparing the ground for a police state. The north, whether alone or with the south, is an extremely diverse place," Arman added.

South Sudan's referendum, expected to take place on January 9th 2011, will determined the future of the largely Christian population in the region. It is expected that the southerners will vote for independence, however, there have been calls form the likes of Libyan leader Colonel Mu'ammar Qadhafi for the country to remain unified.

The head of UN peacekeeping, Alain LeRoy, said that although the situation in Southern Sudan appears to have stabilised the region remains fragile. He also noted that the security situation could become compromised during and after the referendum.

Sources: BBC News, Press TV, Guardian

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

A new measure to tackle LRA’s activities

Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan and Uganda have agreed to form a join military brigade to tackle Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) militants operating in the shared border regions. The LRA, which was formed in Uganda almost 20 years ago by Joseph Kony, has recently mounted deadly attacks in all four countries.

The latest LRA attack was in the Central African Republic's northern town of Birao last Sunday [9th October]. A spokesman for the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) Adrian Edwards said the LRA has carried out more than 240 deadly attacks this year, killing approximately 344 people. Edwards added that the group’s activities also included looting, arson and abduction especially that of young girls.

The new measure to fight the LRA was agreed at Friday’s [15th October] meeting, by ministers of the four affected countries, in Central African Republic’s capital Bangui. The details about the size join venture have not been disclosed, but it is commonly believed that a military group to counter militant activity is thought to include at least 1,000 men.

The four ministers said there’d be a joint operations centre which would allow exchange of intelligence and strategy. The four countries concerned are also expected to set up joint border patrols which would be co-ordinated by special African Union (AU) representative.

Source: BBC News

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

The murder of Merzouk

Around 4:00 a.m. on 12th August, a Tuareg known as Merzouk, whose proper name was Sidi Mohamed ag Chérif, was executed by kidnappers, believed to be members of AQIM, in the Tigharghar mountains of northeastern Mali. Media speculation focused on two assumed motives. One is that it was revenge for his involvement in an attack on the (GSPC)/AQIM emir Mokhtar ben Mokhtar (MBM) in 2006 in which Mokhtar's right-hand man was killed. The other is that he was found to be carrying documents from an unspecified Western embassy in Bamako and was therefore presumably a spy.

The most authoritative account is given on the local Kidal.info website. From this account, it is evident that Merzouk had led a chequered and dangerous life as a Tuareg rebel, a guide to the Malian customs service (with the rank of lieutenant), and an agent for Mali's state security service. He also had a long history of association with MBM, the GSPC, and AQIM. However, one thing not mentioned is that Merzouk, according to another reliable local source, was in regular communication with the US embassy in Bamako. It is therefore possible that he was perceived by AQIM as a spy for the infidel.

Kidal.info mentions that shortly before Merzouk was kidnapped and assassinated, a young friend of his had been captured in Tigharghar by AQIM on suspicion of spying for Merzouk. This tallies with information from Menas sources in the region, namely that Merzouk had given one of his 'cousins' (i.e., close relations) a motorbike and satellite phone and sent him into Tigharghar to get information for him.

The young man's captors ordered him to call Merzouk and to arrange to meet him, whereupon he was kidnapped and then killed. It is therefore quite conceivable that Merzouk was killed by AQIM both for spying on them and for having identified and tracked down several of their members for crimes, such as theft, committed in Mali. However, informed opinion within Algeria is suggesting that his death may have been ordered by the DRS, either because Merzouk, like Lamana Ould Bou before him, had discovered its role in AQIM or as a warning to the Americans that if they want information on the region and AQIM, they must approach the DRS and not try to operate independently.

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

South Sudanese vigilante group to be armed against LRA

Self-defence groups within Southern Sudan, namely the Arrow Boys vigilantes, are being supplied with guns to fend off increasing attacks from the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) rebels. According to Western Equatoria state governor, Joseph Bakasoro, the government will spend around $2 million arming the Arrow Boys.

The UN has estimated that LRA has forced around 25,000 Sudanese from their homes this year alone, and believes that the group now also has a strong presence in Central African Republic (CAR) and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), as well as Sudan.

"The home guard units will be trained and armed so that they can provide effective defence until the regular forces can intervene," said Bakasoro.

It is feared that LRA's attacks in Southern Sudan might increase ahead of January's referendum on the region's independence. Some Southerners believe that Northern political powers opposed to the region's independence are supplying the LRA with arms.

LRA's leader Joseph Kony began his rebellion 20 years ago, aiming to estabilish a Bible based theocracy in Uganda, but has since expanded the group's operations to Sudan, CAR and the DRC. Kony was to sign a peace deal in 2008, negotiated by Southern Sudan, but refused to disarm at the last minute. He is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC), and now lives an itinerant life between Sudan and the CAR.

Source: BBC News

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

Latest news about French hostages and the Political repercussions in Algeria

The latest news on the situation from France's senior military officer, Admiral Edouard Guillaud, (via AFP) is that “France has no plans to use force to rescue [the] five hostages held in the Sahara by al-Qa'ida and wants to negotiate with the militant group.

“Military intervention is not, at the moment I am speaking to you, on the agenda," he told Europe 1 radio. "Of course, French authorities are ready to make contact at any moment, the only problem we have is that, as is usual in this kind of matter, it is the hostage takers who control the timetable," he said.

On 23rd September, French Defence Minister Hervé Morin revealed that France was attempting to get in touch with al-Qa'ida to discover if they have any ransom demands following the hostage taking.

Such incidents can have unforeseen consequences. One relates to the long-running 'story' of the 'secret US base' at Tamanrasset, built by Halliburton's corrupt and now closed subsidiary Brown Root Condor Spa (BRC). The 'story', first documented around 2003, that the US had acquired secret basing rights in Algeria's extreme south, has never gained much traction within Algeria itself. That is largely because the story has been raised mostly in international and predominantly English-language media.

However, on Friday (24th September) the Algerian daily El Watan, picking up on this story in France's Le Canard Enchaîné (CE), revealed to the Algerian public that 400 US troops were stationed at a US secret base [outside Tamanrasset] in Algeria's extreme south. Such a story, if true, would be political dynamite. Coming from Algeria's most respected daily, the story, now finally drawn to the attention of the Algerian public, appears to be causing political ructions.

How and why El Watan published the story is intriguing, and says much for the dangers of both the US and Algeria never having told the whole truth about the base. Hence, rumours and false information flourish. El Watan's figure of 400 US troops comes from an unverified media report from 2003 or thereabouts, which has been regurgitated on an almost annual basis. (Journalists rarely check their sources!). Certainly, it is true that the base does exist, with building having begun around the year 2000, and that the US has used it at various times.

In spite of denials, there is a secret agreement between the US and Algeria which grants the US certain user rights, etc. At one time, about 400 US forces were in the region, with many of them being based temporarily at the base or transiting through it. It is also almost certainly true that a small number of US personnel are based there more or less permanently to man electronic listening and surveillance equipment.

El Watan , we believe, took the story from CE, which in turn dug up the figure of 400US troops from its archives and added them to a Special Report written earlier this week by UPI and published in several media on 23rd September. The very speculative UPI report states: “It is from there [the Tamanrasset base] that the French surveillance aircraft hunting the jihadists and their captives are probably operating.” That may be correct, although most reports have the French air search operating out of Niamey.

This story, of questionable accuracy, looks as if it might finally gain traction within Algeria and thus add to President Abdelaziz Bouteflika's internal political problems, as the way the El Watan story is running suggests that he was the key architect in granting this 'secret facility' to the Americans. In the last 24 hours, the story has received wide coverage through Al Jazeera (Arabic) and possibly other Arab-language channels.

For more news and expert analysis about Algeria please see Algeria Focus and Algeria Politics & Security.

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus.

© 2010 Menas Associates

Frenchman abducted in northern Niger

The situation is very different south of the Algerian border. On the evening of 21 April, within 24 hours of the much-hyped opening of the joint command headquarters at Tamanras­set (SF 2010.01) and an Algerian announce­ment that there would be 75,000 troops in the area by 2012, a Frenchman and his Algerian driver were kidnapped near Teguidda-n-Tessemt, in northern Niger.

The two men had driven south from Tamanras­set and through the In Guezzam border post. The Frenchman, Michel Germaneau, aged 78, is retired and wanted to check on the progress of a school being built at In Abangerit by a charity with which he is associated. His driver, Abedine Ouaghe (known as Dino), is an Algerian from Tamanrasset who works with his brother's tour­ism agency in Agades.

Niger security sources stated that the two were abducted by Taleb Abdoulkrim's group, which claims to be part of that Al Qa'ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) but until now has not been involved in hostage taking. ('Taleb' is the Arabic word for an Islamic cleric.)

Abdoulkrim is the leader of the mosque at Inhal­lil and is allegedly known for violent sermons advocating the supremacy of Islam. Inhallil is the small Mali frontier settlement adjoining Bordj Mokhtar and only a short distance north of Abdelhamid Abou Zaïd's AQIM base in the Tigharghar mountains.

On 6 May, Al Jazeera cited a statement from AQIM that claimed responsibility for this latest hostage taking. AQIM was reported as saying that 'its members managed to kidnap engineer Michel Germaneau in the north of Niger on the 22nd of the previous month.' The group asked France, and those whom it called its allies in the region, to release its jailed members.

According to Niger security sources, the abduction was well planned, suggesting that Abdoulkrim had advance knowledge of his vic­tims' travel plans. Abdoulkrim is reported to have taken the two hostages back into Mali, with Abedine Ouaghe being dropped off in the desert and left to find his way to Tin Zaouatene.

He returned home after two days of alleged debriefing by the Algerian authorities but was then extradited to Niger, where he was wanted in connection with the abduction. He is cur­rently reported to be in detention in Niamey.

An article written in El Watan by the pseudony­mous Selima Tlemçani, who works closely with the Département du Renseignement et de la sécurité (DRS), confirmed that Abdoulkrim and his group were seen passing Boughessa, head­ing in the direction of Inhallil and the Tigharghar Mountains.

For more news and expert analysis about the Sahara region, please see Sahara Focus and Algeria Politics & Security.

© 2010 Menas Associates