5 explosive secret intelligence memos on Libya everyone must read [VIDEO]

Πηγή: The Canary
August 8 2016

Libya is a mess following the western military intervention that started in 2011. We were told it was necessary because there’s an evil dictator who had to be taken out as he was massacring his own people. But is that really why we went to war with Libya?

Muammar Gaddafi did have much blood on his hands – from the so-called Toyota War (or Chadian-Libyan conflict) to taking responsibility for Lockerbie. Not to mention his handy role in George W. Bush’sextraordinary rendition program.

Gaddafi was an interventionist who favoured shady backroom deals and covert action, as well as support of proxies abroad to accomplish his goals.

When anti-Gaddafi protesters took to the streets of Libya in the midst of the ‘Arab Spring’, the UK, US, and France declared Gaddafi’s rule illegitimate. The soon to follow NATO military intervention on behalf of Libyan rebel militants ended with the brutal execution of Gaddafi on the road out of Sirte – ironically, the very city which Libyan ISIS has now made its de facto headquarters.

Some say Gaddafi deserved it. After all, he haphazardly exported enough Semtex around the world, in support of ‘revolutionary’ causes, to supply a small army of indiscriminate killers.

Libertarians, humanitarians, as well as Responsibility 2 Protect (R2P) ‘true believers’ are right to condemn Gaddafi’s legacy of interventionism.

But when western governments militarily intervened in Libya’s civil war, which included bombing urban centres and arming proxy forces, were they really motivated by notions of justice, democracy, and a desire to protect Libyan civilians?

Listed below are five leaked, declassified, and censored intelligence documents which reveal the ugly truths behind what has been described as the West’s “dirty war” in Libya. Direct excerpts from secret documents are in quotes:

1) France wanted control over Gaddafi’s billions in gold and silver bullion as revealed in Hillary Clinton’s 27 March 2011 confidential intelligence brief:

According to knowledgeable individuals this quantity of gold and silver is valued at more than $7 billion. French intelligence officers discovered this plan shortly after the current rebellion began. This was one of the factors that influenced President Nicolas Sarkozy’s decision to commit France to the attack on Libya.

2) The US and UK knew al-Qaeda terrorists were embedded in rebel groups, yet armed them anyway. Read this quote from another Hillary Clinton 27 March 2011 confidential intelligence brief:


French and British Special Operations troops are working out of bases in Egypt, along the Libyan border. These troops are overseeing the transfer of weapons and supplies to the rebels… …Sarkozy is also concerned about continuing reports that radical/terrorist groups such as the Libyan Islamic Fighting Groups and Al Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) are infiltrating the NLC and its military command… …[there’s] a seemingly endless supply of AK47 assault rifles and ammunition… …French, British, and Egyptian Special Forces troops are training rebels inside of western Egypt, and to a limited degree in the western suburbs of Benghazi.

3) A secret Libya to Syria ‘weapons pipeline’ was set up to fuel the devastating conflict in Syria as revealed in this 12 October 2012 Pentagon ‘Secret’ Intelligence Information Report (Defense Intelligence Agency):

Weapons from the former Libya military stockpiles were shipped from the port of Benghazi, Libya to the Port of Banias and the Port of Borj Islam, Syria. The weapons shipped during late-August 2012 were Sniper rifles, RPG’s, and 125 mm and 155mm howitzers missiles.

During the immediate aftermath of, and following the uncertainty caused by, the downfall of the ((Qaddafi)) regime in October 2011 and up until early September of 2012, weapons from the former Libya military stockpiles located in Benghazi, Libya were shipped from the port of Benghazi, Libya to the ports of Banias and the Port of Borj Islam, Syria.

4) Fake propaganda was planted in the media to make Gaddafi look like a fanatical monster that must be stopped. This from a 27 March 2011 Hillary Clinton confidential intelligence brief:

I communicated more than a week ago on this story—Qaddafi placing bodies to create PR stunts about supposed civilian casualties as a result of Allied bombing—though underlining it was a rumor. But now, as you know, Robert Gates gives credence to it. (See story below.)

Sources now say, again rumor (that is, this information comes from the rebel side and is unconfirmed independently by Western intelligence), that Qaddafi has adopted a rape policy and has even distributed Viagra to troops.

5) Secretary of State Clinton was informed there was no real humanitarian basis for NATO’s bombing, though NATO would continue its devastating bombing of Libya for another seven months anyway. This according to Hillary Clinton’s 30 March 2011 confidential intelligence brief:

…extending US influence…should be obvious. It is a vital national interest today, now, at this moment. The humanitarian motive offered is limited, conditional and refers to a specific past situation.

See below video of then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton grilled by a congressional committee over the secret weapons shipments sent from Libya to fuel the war in Syria:

Al Qaeda weapons expert: U.S. ambassador to Libya killed by lethal injection

Πηγή: Washington Times
By Bill Gertz
June 5 2013

An al Qaeda terrorist stated in a recent online posting that U.S. Ambassador to Libya J. Christopher Stevens was killed by lethal injection after plans to kidnap him during the Sept. 11 attacks in Benghazi went bad.

The veracity of the claim by Abdallah Dhu-al-Bajadin, who was identified by U.S. officials as a weapons expert for al Qaeda, could not be determined. However, U.S. officials have not dismissed the terrorist’s assertion.

An FBI spokeswoman indicated that the bureau is aware of the claim but declined to comment because of the ongoing investigation into the Benghazi attacks.

“While there is a great deal of information in the media and on the Internet about the attack in Benghazi, the FBI is not in a position at this time to comment on anything specific with regard to the investigation,” spokeswoman Kathy Wright said.

A State Department spokesman had no comment.

The FBI is investigating the deaths of Stevens, State Department information officer Sean Smith, and former Navy SEALs Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty. They were killed in attacks that U.S. officials say were carried out by an al Qaeda-linked group known as Ansar al-Sharia.

A State Department Accountability Review Board report and an interim House Republican report on the attacks gave no cause of death for Stevens, whose body was recovered by Libyans in the early hours of Sept. 12.

The House report, “Interim Progress Report for the House Republican Conference,” said that “Libyan doctors tried unsuccessfully to resuscitate Ambassador Stevens upon his arrival at the hospital.”

To date, no official cause of death for Stevens has been made public, although it was reported that a Libyan doctor who examined Stevens said he died from apparent smoke inhalation and related asphyxiation.

Video and photos of Stevens being handled by a mob in Benghazi were posted on the Internet. It is not clear from the images whether he was dead or alive at the time.

According to a March 14 posting on an al Qaeda-linked website, Dhu-al-Bajadin stated that Stevens was given a lethal injection that was overlooked during the autopsy.

The “plan was based on abduction and exchange of high-level prisoners,” the terrorist wrote on the prominent jihadist Web forum Ansar al-Mujahideen Network. “However, the operation took another turn, for a reason God only knows, when one of the members of the jihadist cell improvised and followed Plan B.”

Dhu-al-Bajadin’s claim of assassination also was copied to the Ansar al-Mujahidin website from the al Qaeda-accredited website Shumukh al-Islam. That site is open only to members, and the claim initially was posted for Dhu-al-Bajadin by a member identified as Adnan Shukri.

The reference to Shumukh al-Islam has boosted the credibility of the claim among some U.S. intelligence analysts. A Western intelligence official said Dhu-al-Bajadin is a well-known jihadist and a key figure behind a magazine called Al Qaeda Airlines.

According to this official, intelligence analysts believe Dhu-al-Bajadin’s claim of assassination by lethal injection appears aimed, in part, at pressuring the U.S. government on its handling of the Benghazi attacks.

The article did not say what substance was used in the lethal injection. It also stated that the State Department had come under criticism for not providing adequate security in Benghazi before the attacks.

Dhu-al-Bajadin said he had more details about the attacks and the assassination, but would not reveal them in the posting.

The Washington Free Beacon obtained a copy of the translation of Dhu-al-Bajadin’s posting in Arabic.

The article stated that lethal injections are done in “more than one place in the human body that autopsy doctors ignore when they see that the symptoms are similar to another specific and common illness.”

“Anyone who studied the art of silent assassination that spies applied during the Cold War would easily identify these parts of the body,” the article stated.

Dhu-al-Bajadin has said the Al Qaeda Airlines publication is not solely focused on aviation but was chosen as a way to instill fear in the enemy.

Insight: Libya becomes 'the new Mali' as Islamists shift in Sahara

Πηγή: Reuters
By David Lewis
May 31 2013

Suicide attacks on a French-run mine and a military base in northern Niger have shown how an Islamist threat is spreading across the weak nations of the Sahara, meaning France may be tied down there for years to come.

Regional rivalries are aggravating the problem for Paris and its Western allies, with a lack of cooperation between Saharan countries helping militants to melt away when they come under pressure and regroup in quieter parts of the vast desert.

Security officials say lawless southern Libya has become the latest haven for al Qaeda-linked fighters after French-led forces drove them from strongholds in northern Mali this year, killing hundreds.

"The south of Libya is what the north of Mali was like before," said a senior adviser to Mali's interim President Diouncounda Traore, asking not to be named.

Niger has said last week's suicide raids, which killed 25 people at the army base and desert uranium mine run by France's Areva, were launched from Libya. Amid growing tensions between the two countries, Libya has denied this.

Chad, which played a leading role in the Mali campaign, said a man was shot dead in an attack on its consulate in the Libyan desert town of Sabha at the weekend.

Smugglers have long used Libya's poorly patrolled south - a crossroads of routes to Chad, Niger and Algeria - for trafficking drugs, contraband cigarettes and people to Europe.

But the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011 flooded the Sahara with pillaged weapons and ammunition. Tuareg separatists used them to seize power in northern Mali, only to be ousted by even better-armed Islamists who set up training camps and imposed harsh Islamic law until the French forces arrived.

The Islamists have also exploited Libya's weakness. Veteran al Qaeda commander Moktar Belmokhtar bought weapons there after Gaddafi's fall and his fighters passed through southern Libya to carry out a mass hostage-taking at an Algerian gas plant in January, in which 37 foreigners died.

A spokesman for the MUJWA, an al Qaeda-linked group which controlled parts of Mali last year, told Mauritania's al Akhbar news site that the Niger attack was not prepared in southern Libya. But Belmokhtar's group said it also took part.

With no effective national army, Libya relies on local brigades to police its southern border region where at least 100 people died in ethnic violence last year. Tripoli's failure to restore security there may be encouraging permanent Islamist camps and weapons stores, security officials say.

France, which relies on neighbouring Niger for one fifth of the uranium powering its nuclear reactors, has urged regional powers to cooperate to tackle the threat from Libya.

"We're extremely concerned that what's happening in southern Libya could replicate what happened in Mali," a French diplomatic source said, adding that the defence minister had raised the issue on a recent visit to Washington and London. "Dealing with that problem needs to be fast-tracked."

Paris is keen to cut its troop numbers in the region. But, amid persistent bickering and mistrust among regional powers, President Francois Hollande admitted last week that French forces may have be used elsewhere in the Sahel.

Alarmed European governments also approved a 110-man mission this week to improve border security by training Libyan police and security forces. [ID:nL6N0E34Q0] But Paris feels this is being deployed too slowly, given the urgency of the situation.

"As much as the West may wish to leave the problem to Africans, it cannot," said Vicki Huddleston, a former U.S. ambassador to Mali. "Islamists will continue to fight until defeated by the region working together and supported by Western governments."

LACK OF COOPERATION

Borders often have little meaning in a desert where militants can blend in with nomads, and hunting Islamists requires states riven by mutual suspicion to work together.

Algeria, the Sahara's main military power, has long bristled at the idea of outside intervention in the region, particularly one led by its former colonial ruler, France.

It allowed French war planes operating in Mali to fly over its territory. But the Malian official said Algeria had to be more active, whether by arresting militants or preventing the flow of fuel that allows them to cover vast desert distances - the northern Mali town of Gao lies about 1,500 km (930 miles) from the border of southern Libya.

"Algeria's cooperation is essential but they are not on the frontline," he said.

Mauritania also needed to do more because of its strategic location on the western edge of the Sahara, the high number of its citizens who are senior militants, and its experience in tackling Islamists at home, he said.

U.S. officials said efforts to tackle the spreading influence of al Qaeda's Sahara branch had been beset by long-standing rivalries, notably between Morocco and Algeria, and a lack of trust and communication between regional capitals.

Plans to set up a Saharan anti-terrorist command center in southern Algeria never materialised. A low point, officials in Mali's interim government say, was reached in 2011 when senior figures in the previous administration leaked the positions of Mauritanian troops attacking al Qaeda bases in Mali.

Relations between Mali and Mauritania had already soured in 2010 when Bamako released a Mauritanian al Qaeda commander in return for a kidnapped hostage, prompting Nouakchott to recall its ambassador.

The changing face of Islamist militancy creates particular problems for governments. For years Al Qaeda's North African wing AQIM relied largely on Algerians but they were joined last year by gunmen from across northern and parts of West Africa.

The MUJWA group includes more black Africans better able to drift unnoticed between West African nations since France's onslaught. "They have deployed to other theatres," said Soumeylou BouBeye Maiga, a former Malian foreign minister and security chief. "They will take on France elsewhere as there is a concentration of forces here."

Niger's long border with Mali, tough line on tackling the militants and role as a supplier of uranium to France have long made it a target. U.S. troops are training the army and Niamey has stepped up security in the north, where French Special Forces went this year to protect mines. Four French mine workers seized in Arlit in 2010 are still being held.

U.N. conflict expert Ismael Diallo said France, which had originally ruled out using ground troops in Mali, was gradually being dragged deeper into policing the region.

"France has no choice," said Diallo, a former senior official in Burkina Faso. "Regional cooperation will not improve soon enough and to a credible level to deter the armed groups."

"WE ARE WATCHING"

In Mali, drone surveillance and counter-terrorism teams on the ground have done much to stifle the militants. Suicide attacks around the northern towns of Gao and Menaka this month claimed no victims apart from the bombers themselves.

According to French officials, about 600 Islamists have been killed in "Operation Serval", named after a desert wildcat.

About 200 tonnes of ammunition and dozens of vehicles were seized in operations that scoured desert and mountain bases, disrupting arms and fuel dumps that the Islamists prepared during their nine-month occupation of northern Mali.

"They don't seem to have the ability to coordinate attacks in Mali anymore," said a French officer in Mali. "We assume that they will try to regroup but it will take time for them and it is risky as they know we are watching."

French operations have been backed by a British spy plane and U.S. drones operating from Niger alongside an established monitoring base in Burkina Faso.

But Islamists who once traveled in large convoys have adapted and are keeping a low profile. "At any given time, they could be anywhere," said a U.S. official. "People go where the fight is."

Al-Qaeda in Libya: A Profile

A Report Prepared by the Federal Research Division, Library of Congress under an Interagency Agreement with the Combating Terrorism Technical Support Office’s Irregular Warfare Support Program, August 2012.

AL-QAEDA IN LIBYA: A PROFILE

How Obama, Hillary Wrecked Libya

Gregory Hicks, former deputy chief of mission in Libya, testifies before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee's hearing on the deadly assault of the U.S. diplomatic mission in Benghazi in Washington, Wednesday, May 8, 2013. 

Πηγή: WND
By Aaron Klein
May 30 2013

TEL AVIV – A Library of Congress report that received almost no media attention detailed – one month before the deadly Sept. 11 attack in Benghazi – how al-Qaida established a major base of operations in Libya in the aftermath of the U.S.-NATO campaign that deposed Muammar Gadhafi and his secular regime.

The report documented al-Qaida and affiliated organizations were establishing terrorist training camps and pushing Taliban-style Islamic law in Libya while the new, Western-backed Libyan government incorporated jihadists into its militias.

The document named Benghazi as a new central headquarters for al-Qaida activities.

“Al-Qaeda adherents in Libya used the 2011 Revolution to establish well-armed, well-trained, and combat-experienced militias,” stated the report.

The report also said a terrorist released from the U.S. Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba became the leader of the al-Qaida-affiliate Ansar Al-Sharia in Libya, which espoused anti-Western ideology.

The Martyrs of 17 February Brigade, which was hired by the State Department to protect the U.S. facility in Benghazi, operates under the Ansar-Al-Sharia banner.

The document said scores of Islamic extremists were freed from Libyan prison after the U.S.-supported revolution in Libya.

The August 2012 document was prepared by the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress under an inter-agency agreement with the Combating Terrorism Technical Support Office’s Irregular Warfare Support Program. It may shed new light on the terrorism threat in Libya leading up to the assaults on the U.S. facility and CIA annex in Benghazi.

Despite the growing al-Qaida activity, the U.S. facilities in Benghazi remained poorly protected.

While al-Qaida and other extremist groups were establishing their new headquarters in Libya, the Obama administration reportedly was eager to declare the U.S.-NATO campaign there a victory.

According to testimony by the No. 2 U.S. official in Tripoli, who served under murdered Ambassador Christopher Stevens, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton wanted the Benghazi facility turned into a permanent post ahead of her scheduled December 2012 visit to the country. A looming funding deadline may have been the reason that Stevens went to the compound the day of the attacks, the whistleblower charged.

Terrorist training camps

The report shows how various al-Qaida groups, including Al-Qaida Senior Leadership (AQSL) and Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), have sought to take advantage of the downfall of Gadhafi to “create a safe haven and possibly to extend their area of operations to Libya.”

AQSL in Pakistan issued strategic guidance to followers in Libya and elsewhere to take advantage of the Libyan rebellion. Specifically, instructions were given to gather weapons, establish training camps, establish an Islamic state, and institute Shariah, the document relates.

At the time of the report’s release, al-Qaida’s clandestine network in Libya was “in an expansion phase, running training camps and media campaigns on social-media platforms.”

The Libyan revolution “may have created an environment conducive to jihad and empowered the large and active community of Libyan jihadists, which is known to be well connected to international jihad,” the document stated.

The Library of Congress report said Ansar al-Sharia, led by Sufian Ben Qhumu, a former Guantanamo detainee, has increasingly embodied al-Qaida’s presence in Libya.

Qhumu, formerly a driver for Osama bin Laden, was released by the U.S. in 2007 and was transferred to a Libyan prison where he remained until being freed in a 2010 amnesty deal.

Shariah confab

The report noted AQSL’s strategic goals remain “restoration of the caliphate, instituting sharia, and ending the Western presence in Muslim lands.”

“Al-Qaeda’s primary goal in Libya is to establish an Islamic emirate as part of its overall objective to reestablish the caliphate,” the report said.

“The al-Qaeda clandestine network in Libya is most likely espousing a Taliban-like religious orientation that calls for strict adherence to the practice and principles of Islam as interpreted by radical clerics.”

From June 7 to 8, 2012, there was a gathering of groups supporting Shariah openly held at Liberation Square in Benghazi. The event was hosted by Ansar al-Sharia and reportedly attended by at least 15 militias, including al-Qaida-affiliated organizations.

Libyan government and al-Qaida

The report noted the July 2012 elections in Libya “failed to generate a strong and unified national leadership that could address the chronic insecurity posed by the multiplicity of local militias, which al-Qaeda’s clandestine network has probably infiltrated.”

Further, the Western-backed National Transitional Council in Libya “never fully controlled the rebel movement.”

Following the 2012 elections, the Libyan army and police have reconstituted their ranks “by incorporating whole militias regardless of the militants’ background.”

Hillary eager to declare victory

While al-Qaida and other Islamic groups gained major ground in Libya following U.S. intervention there, Clinton worked plans for a symbolic victory in Benghazi, according to congressional testimony by Gregory Hicks, the former State Department deputy chief of mission and chargé d’affairs who was in Libya at the time of the attack.

Under questioning from Rep. James Lankford, R-Okla., Hicks explained: “According to [Ambassador] Chris [Stevens], Secretary Clinton wanted Benghazi converted into a permanent constituent post. Timing for this decision was important. Chris needed to report before Sept. 30, the end of the fiscal year, on the physical and the political and security environment in Benghazi to support an action memo to convert Benghazi from a temporary facility to a permanent facility.”

Hicks revealed the directive came from the State Department Office of Near Eastern Affairs, headed by Acting Assistant Secretary Beth Jones. Money was available to be transferred to Benghazi from a State Department fund set aside for Iraq available, provided the funds transfer had been done by Sept. 30.

He further testified that in May 2012, during a meeting Clinton, Stevens promised he would give priority to making sure the U.S. facility at Benghazi was transformed into a permanent constituent post.

Hicks also explained Stevens wanted to make a symbolic gesture to the people of Benghazi that the United States “stood behind their dream of establishing a new democracy.”

Additionally, he wanted to have the Benghazi complex upgraded to a permanent constituent post, so Clinton could make the announcement in her planned visit to Libya before the end of 2012.

Toward the end of the hearing, the chairman, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., asked Hicks to summarize his testimony on why Stevens went to Benghazi.

“At least one of the reasons Ambassador Stevens was in Benghazi was to further the secretary’s wish that that post become a permanent constituent post and that he was also there because we understood the secretary intended to visit Tripoli later in the year,” Hicks reiterated. “We hoped that she would be able to announce to the Libyan people the establishment of a permanent constituent post in Benghazi at that time.”

Clinton and the U.S. diplomatic staff in Libya reportedly were aware of the terrorist camps in Benghazi. Fox News reported last year the U.S. mission in Benghazi convened an “emergency meeting” in August 2012 to discuss the training camps.

The news network obtained a government cable addressed to Clinton’s office stating the U.S. diplomats in Libya were briefed “on the location of approximately ten Islamist militias and AQ training camps within Benghazi … these groups ran the spectrum from Islamist militias, such as the QRF Brigade and Ansar al-Sharia, to ‘Takfirist thugs.’”

EU decision to lift Syrian oil sanctions boosts jihadist groups

A makeshift oil refinery site in al-Mansoura village, al-Raqqa province.

Πηγή: The Guardian
By Julian Borger and Mona Mahmood
May 19 2013

The EU decision to lift Syrian oil sanctions to aid the opposition has accelerated a scramble for control over wells and pipelines in rebel-held areas and helped consolidate the grip of jihadist groups over the country's key resources.

Jabhat al-Nusra, affiliated with al-Qaida and other extreme Islamist groups, control the majority of the oil wells in Deir Ezzor province, displacing local Sunni tribes, sometimes by force. They have also seized control of other fields from Kurdish groups further to the north-east, in al-Hasakah governorate.

As opposition groups have turned their guns on each other in the battle over oil, water and agricultural land, military pressure on Bashar al-Assad's government from the north and east has eased off. In some areas, al-Nusra has struck deals with government forces to allow the transfer of crude across the front lines to the Mediterranean coast.

Syria oil fire map

As a result of the rush to make quick money, open-air refineries have been set up in Deir Ezzor and al-Raqqa provinces. Crude is stored in ditches and heated in metal tanks by wood fires, shrouding the region with plumes of black smoke, exposing the local population to the dangers of the thick smog and the frequent explosions at the improvised plants.

Heating oil, diesel and petrol is condensed in hoses running from the tanks through pools of water and sold across the north, as far as Aleppo. The remaining crude is shipped by road on tankers to Turkey.

One leading opposition figure said: "The northern front hasn't just gone dormant; the northern front has gone commercial."

The EU announced it was lifting its oil embargo in April to help the moderate opposition. The implementation regulations have yet to be issued so the decision has not taken effect, but regional experts say the announcement intensified the race for oil – a race the western-backed moderates lost.

Joshua Landis, an expert on the region at the University of Oklahoma who runs the Syria Comment blog, said the EU decision on oil "sent a message that oil could come back online faster than most thought possible".

"Whoever gets their hands on the oil, water and agriculture, holds Sunni Syria by the throat. At the moment, that's al-Nusra," Landis said. "Europeopening up the market for oil forced this issue. So the logical conclusion from this craziness is that Europe will be funding al-Qaida."

Abu Albara, an al-Nusra fighter who spoke to the Guardian by telephone from Deir Ezzor, said: "Now, we can say that most of the oil wells are in the hands of the rebels, only a single oil facility in Hasakah is still under the control of [Kurdish fighters]. There are two other oil wells close to the Iraqi borders in the desert. The Iraqi army have surrounded them with tanks but we do not know what they are doing with them."

The al-Nusra guerilla said the group was merely guarding the wells it captured, but the rival groups have accused the Islamists of asset-stripping them for quick money.

"Jabhat al-Nusra is investing in the Syrian economy to reinforce its position in Syria and Iraq. Al-Nusra fighters are selling everything that falls into their hands from wheat, archaeological relics, factory equipment, oil drilling and imaging machines, cars, spare parts and crude oil," Abu Saif, a fighter with the Ahrar Brigade, linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, told the Guardian by phone from the Deir Ezzor area.

"The Syrian regime itself is paying more than 150m Syrian lire [£1.4m] monthly to Jabhat al-Nusra to guarantee oil is kept pumping through two major oil pipelines in Banias and Latakia. Middlemen trusted by both sides are to facilitate the deal and transfer money to the organisation."

A western diplomat watching the situation said: "We understand that in Deir Ezzor, it's a bit of a mix. Al-Nusra is there and there is sometimes co-operation with the regime for practical reasons. In some areas oil products are being given to the local communities, but there are clear dangers in these kinds of open-air refineries."

The diplomat said the EU implementation regulation for the lifting of the oil embargo would include safeguard clauses that would give the western-backed opposition, the National Coalition, the power to authorise exports. But as things stand, the coalition and its allies hold very little of Syria's oil wealth in their hands.

A former Syrian oil executive in the rebel-held areas said: "In the last few months, they seem to have figured a way to sell the oil supply across the lines from the rebels to government forces, through intermediaries trusted on both sides."

The former executive said the oil trade had spawned a growing demand for oil tanker lorries, as a single shipment could earn a profit of up to $10,000 (£6,600). He added that al-Nusra and other jihadist groups were using much of the money to win hearts and minds in areas they have captured, such as al-Raqqa city, which fell in March.

"If you look at what the money does in these places," he said, asking for his name not to be used because of the sensitivity of the issue. "It doesn't take a rocket scientist. You bring in flour, you repair the bakeries, so there are big smiles in the local community. It's an incredible marketing machine."

In April, the head of the western-backed rebel Supreme Military Council, General Selim Idriss, pledged to create a force to secure the oilfields and other economic resources in Deir Ezzor, al-Hasakah and Raqqa provinces, but that force has yet to materialise and observers doubt Idriss has the money, manpower or weaponry to displace the jihadists.

"Idriss probably felt he had to say that, to reassure the Europeans," Landis said. "But nobody takes such claims seriously. Where is he going to get 30,000 men from?"

The only rivals to the power of the jihadists in the oil region are the Kurds in al-Hasakah, and the Sunni tribes around Deir Ezzor, who have found themselves increasingly marginalised by Islamic extremists.

In one well-documented case, fighting broke out in the village of al-Musareb, near Deir Ezzor, between al-Nusra fighters and local tribesmen over ownership of an oil tanker. The al-Nusra commander, a Saudi called Qasura al-Jazrawi, was killed. As a reprisal, the jihadist group levelled much of the village and executed 50 of its residents.

Apart from the latest round of conflict the oil rush has triggered, human rights campaigners have raised concerns about the health impact of the wildcat refining industry. Skin and breathing complaints have become common while there are reports of workers on the improvised oil fields, including children, being burned to death in accidents.

An opposition activist in Hasakah, Salman Kurdi, said: "They refine oil by boiling it to very high temperatures by using gas cans, and most of the time, they blow up. It's killed many of the people who work there.

"A month ago, an explosion happened in an oil well called Shadada, in the countryside south of here, and five people were killed. They dig a big hole and put lots of fire in it and gas to make it boiling. If you travel south to the countryside, you can spot the smoke rising every few kilometres."

Al Qaeda Headquarters in Libya

Libyan security forces gather outside the French Embassy in Tripoli following a car-bomb attack on April 23. 

Πηγή: The Daily Beast
By Jamie Dettmer
May 6 2013

The volatile country, still reeling after the Benghazi attack and several recent bombings, has become a magnet for al Qaeda terrorists determined to sow instability in the region.

A rare interview with a top Libyan intelligence official reveals that, as an unintended consequence of the French intervention to quash a radical Muslim insurgency in nearby Mali, which forced al Qaeda in the Mahgreb to move north earlier this year, Libya has now become the main base of the terror group in the region, heightening the instability of what is already a volatile country.

“Libya has become AQIM’s headquarters,” says the intelligence source, adding that in just the last few weeks three new al Qaeda camps have opened in southern Libya.

The terror group’s boosted presence in Libya comes at a time when the struggling country is reeling from several threats to—or attacks on—Western targets.

On April 23, jihadist bombers sought to attack the British Council in Tripoli just minutes after other members of a suspected al Qaeda cell managed to detonate a powerful blast outside the French Embassy. The embassy bombing left two gendarmes injured—one seriously—and wounded several locals. The attack on the British Council failed—thanks to the incompetence of the jihadists.

As The Daily Beast revealed last week, the British Council, a government-funded educational body under the aegis of the British foreign office, was also an al Qaeda target April 23 in the first attacks on foreign missions in the capital since the ouster 18 months ago of Col. Muammar Gaddafi. Libyan and foreign security officials fear the attacks may herald the start of a jihadist terror campaign in the country.

British officials have declined to confirm or deny the planned attack, saying, “Our security policy is not to comment on security matters.”

But more details of what happened outside the British Council have now been divulged to The Daily Beast by local sources who asked to remain anonymous for safety reasons, indicating that the attack wasn’t in fact foiled by alert security guards, but was botched by a bomber who panicked after he parked his car, heavily laden with explosives, too close to a high concrete bollard and was unable to open his door.

Security sources says the would-be terrorist—he’s been dubbed the Keystone Bomber—then tried to exit through a window, prompting a guard, apparently oblivious to the danger, to call out, offering help.

Mistaking the offer of assistance as a challenge, a companion in a nearby getaway vehicle sped away, turned at a junction, and crashed into a parked vehicle before escaping. The bomber also drove off, prompting the alarm reported last week by The Daily Beast of jihadists hunting for another high-profile Western target to attack.

The whole saga was captured on CCTV cameras at the British Council in the smart residential district of Hay Andalous, a few blocks from the French embassy. The attacks were clearly coordinated with the British Council explosion planned to go off six minutes or so after the embassy bomb.

Despite the botched operation outside the British Council, foreign and Libyan security officials say the planning and bomb making involved in the attacks were of a high standard. At the embassy the bombers parked the car as close as possible to the perimeter wall, so when the blast hit, concrete shards were hurled in all directions. The British Council bomber was clearly ordered to do the same thing.

Though Western officials are close-lipped about the general threat that the jihadists pose, the president of Chad, Idriss Déby, complained last week that Libya isn’t doing enough to prevent these fighters from using Libya as a training ground for new recruits, undermining security in the region. The Libyan government has denied the claims, saying there has been no influx of jihadists from Mali.

Disgruntled militiamen in league with the Muslim Brotherhood last week applied a choke hold on the government by besieging key ministries in an effort to coerce approval of a measure that is likely to collapse of the government of Ali Zeidan, plunging Libya into even greater political turmoil and weakening Libya’s ability to battle jihadists.

The measure that passed May 6 disbars officials who worked for Gaddafi’s regime from public office. Many in the cabinet will be forced to leave.

Since the assault last September on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi that left ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans dead, Libyan jihadist groups have been undergoing a reconfiguration, with more of them coming under the direct sway of AQIM. One Libyan intelligence source likens it to a “swarm of bees” accepting a new queen bee.

According to this source, AQIM didn’t order or plot directly the assault on the U.S. Consulate but was involved in the decision to attack, which was taken not by a single mastermind, but by a committee of Libyan and Egyptian jihadist ringleaders. “Radical cells in several of Benghazi’s revolutionary militias were involved in the decision,” he says, including members of the February 17 Brigade, the militia that also had guards detailed to protect the consulate.

He says the leaders of the militia most frequently blamed for the attack, Ansar al-Sharia, were not involved in the assault, although radical subordinates were. Other attackers came from the Omar Mukhtar brigade, the Abu Salem Martyrs Brigade, and the Rafala Sahati brigade. Three Algerian members of AQIM were present at the assault on the consulate and for the subsequent attack on a nearby CIA compound, where consulate staff fled. “They are now fighting in Syria,” he says.

Some Libyan officials believe there was double intelligence failure in the lead up to the consulate attack—with both the CIA and the jihadists misunderstanding the intentions and operations of the other by misinterpreting the macabre “language of espionage and terrorism.”

In the weeks before the assault there were more than two dozen assassinations of former Gaddafi security and intelligence officials in Benghazi. Some were score-settling slayings by hard-core revolutionaries out to revenge Gaddafi-era oppression, but most were jihadist hits on people thought to be acting as informants for American spies based at the Benghazi CIA annex. The jihadists thought the Americans would take the hint and shutter the CIA base. But most of those slain weren’t in fact informants, and the Americans didn't realize Benghazi jihadists had the annex in their sight.

Since Zeidan came into office last year and to the frustration of U.S. lawmakers, there have been no significant official updates on the progress a Libyan probe is making into Stevens’s death.

Al-Qaeda: Regional Menace Or Global Threat?

Members of the hardline al Shabaab Islamist rebel group hold their weapons in Somalia's capital Mogadishu, January 1, 2010.

Πηγή: International Business Times
By Jacey Fortin
Jan 31 2013

With a video camera rolling straight ahead and the black flag of al-Qaeda behind him, a one-eyed jihadist and cigarette smuggler named Mokhtar Belmokhtar spelled out his vision for the future of Islamist militancy on a global scale.

It was Jan. 17, during the four-day hostage crisis at a gas plant in the deserts of eastern Algeria, where workers of various nationalities were held hostage until national forces retook the facility. Up to 85 people died in the bloody showdown.

The video, released by the Mauritanian news outlet Sahara Media, marked a new phase in the conflict that's still raging in the northern reaches of the West African country of Mali. There, Islamist insurgents had established a haven for militants -- an unprecedented feat after years of sporadic clashes. At the request of the Malian central government, French forces swooped in with airstrikes and combat troops on Jan. 11.

Only days later, Belmokhtar and his newly formed cell seized the gas plant in Algeria in a clear indication that the insurgents’ ambitions reached far beyond Mali. Belmokhtar called the Western intervention a “crusade” and commended his own forces for their success.

“We did it for al-Qaeda,” he said in the video.

For many militants in North and West Africa, the language of jihad has global undertones. And Western powers are taking notice; the United Kingdom has sent hundreds of non-combat troops to Mali, and the United States has stepped up its logistical support for the intervention.

The resurgence of al-Qaeda in Africa has raised concerns about the international threat these militants pose. In the past decade, the global al-Qaeda organization has been weakened significantly. But new conflicts involving Western forces could influence the movement in more subtle ways, strengthening its power to influence lone operatives in far-flung corners of the world.

Deep Roots

Organizationally, al-Qaeda has undergone a sea change over the past several years. Western offensives -- including hundreds of U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan and Yemen -- have decimated the cadre of leaders who were behind the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on U.S. soil. When Osama bin-Laden was killed by American forces in May of 2011, his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, took over. But Zawahiri has been less effective than bin Laden in terms of galvanizing the global movement; he has little of bin-Laden’s magnetism and scant experience on the battlefield.

Although the al-Qaeda's core leadership has been weakened, its affiliates are increasingly picking up the slack. The emergence of locally rooted groups has much to do with the Arab Spring revolutions; in countries like Egypt, Libya and Yemen, regime changes have left dangerous power vacuums, upended national security apparatuses and weakened border controls.

This was particularly important in Libya. In the build-up to the overthrow of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, the regime hired mercenaries to fight on its behalf. Those warriors-for-pay -- which included hundreds of nomadic peoples from the Sahara and the Sahel -- acquired weapons and training that would have been hard to come by without Libya's funding.

Andrew MacGregor, senior editor of the Jamestown Foundation Global Terrorism Analysis Program in Washington, D.C., says the rise in militancy in 2012 was partly a result of the overflow of arms from the Libyan revolution.

“Simultaneous with the spread of arms throughout the region, you had a spread of radical Salafism [an ultraconservative branch of Sunni Islam],” he said. “Those two fed off each other, creating jihadist movements and threatening regional security. What we’ve seen lately is these movements trying to seize territory for themselves, now that they have the weaponry to do so.”

This empowered a branch of al-Qaeda that had hitherto been little more than a regional menace.

Weaving a Web

Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, or AQIM, officially coalesced in 2007; its roots are Algerian, though it now includes militants from countries across North and West Africa.

It is not the only affiliate that has made gains in recent years. Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, a combination of jihadist cells from Yemen and Saudi Arabia, came together in 2009. Al-Qaeda in Iraq, or AQI, coalesced shortly after the American-led invasion of that country in 2003 and now focuses its attacks on government officials and civilians.

Other jihadist organizations with links to al-Qaeda include al-Shabaab in Somalia, Lashkar-e-Taiba in Pakistan and Jabhat al-Nusra in Syria. Still others may lack formal links, but they share al-Qaeda’s ultraconservative ideology and are sympathetic to its goals and methods.

These groups have had a major impact locally. In Mali, the enforcement of a harsh version of Shariah, or Islamic law, has led to executions, amputations and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people. In Iraq, communities of Shi’a Muslims and moderate Sunnis have been targeted by extremist militants for years. In Yemen, national troops backed by the United States are engaged in a battle with militants who are launching retaliatory attacks against civilians.

But when we zoom out to assess the global threat of al-Qaeda and related groups, the picture blurs. The very fragmentation that has weakened al-Qaeda's core leadership has also made it much harder to pin down, and the regularly shifting alliances between various groups have confounded Western efforts to isolate the problem.

According to McGregor, that may be part of the plan. “When we talk about AQIM, for instance, we’re not really talking about any kind of united movement,” he says.

“There are many groups technically operating on their own, or else splitting off and congealing again. This is partly strategic; it tends to throw off intelligence agencies and analysts who wind up making too much of these splits. Sometimes there’s something behind it, but sometimes it’s just an effective way of keeping the opposition off guard.”

Going It Alone

Though al-Qaeda is far less centralized than it once was, regional branches cannot be discounted.

“While the leadership of the al-Qaeda core is on the ropes, local events from Syria to North Africa to Yemen can still help it regain traction,” says Matthew Levitt, director of the Stein Program on Counterterrorism and Intelligence at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

“Moreover, these events have clearly empowered local al-Qaeda affiliates, making it likely that we’re already seeing the next iteration of the al-Qaeda threat, which is still transnational and targeting the West even as its roots tie in to more local conflicts.”

Those local conflicts are complicated. In Mali, for example, many aspects of the rebellion are rooted in ethnic rivalries, and disagreements abound as to the ultimate goal of the insurgency. But as long as the violent clashes retain their power to stir passions in militant communities around the world, al-Qaeda’s reach extends far beyond the blurry borders of its home bases.

For Western countries, lone wolf operatives -- individual actors who attempt to perpetrate attacks despite their distance from al-Qaeda’s core communities -- present the clearest danger. Networks of would-be militants around the world are linked by a vast online network of forums and chat rooms, and it is through these channels that al-Qaeda leaders often distribute videos to encourage their particular brand of jihad.

So while al-Qaeda may be fractured, militant aspects of its ideology can still thrive thousands of miles away.

The West got its most traumatic recent reminder of this phenomenon in last March, when Mohamed Merah, a 23-year-old Islamist of Algerian descent, killed seven people in a shooting spree in the southern French city of Toulouse.

But lone wolves do not have a reputation for professionalism and have been repeatedly foiled by Western security forces, many of which have fine-tuned their counter-terrorism tactics over the past decade and now use questionable methods of surveillance and infiltration to target suspected terrorists.

“We have to remember that the bigger attacks, like the one we saw in Algeria, have to be planned weeks or months in advance. Lone wolf attacks are another phenomenon entirely; they are by nature unpredictable,” says McGregor, adding that it makes more sense to focus on larger organizations to observe trends and tendencies.

To prevent tragedies like the Algerian gas plant crisis from striking even closer to home, it is necessary for Western powers to walk a fine line: responding to threats quickly and intelligently without resorting to the divisive fear tactics that paint a heavily skewed picture of Islam and may further al-Qaeda’s own aims.

For now, the threat al-Qaeda poses is largely regional -- but with hundreds of thousands of people displaced, persecuted or cut off from resources in these various pockets of militant activity, that doesn’t make the problem any less serious.

Al Qaeda targets Germans, Britons in Libya: Spiegel

Πηγή: Reutrers
By Spiegel
Jan 27 2013

Al Qaeda is plotting to kidnap German and British citizens in Libya, the Spiegel weekly magazine quoted German intelligence sources as saying.

Germany and Britain were among several Western countries to urge their nationals to leave the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi on Thursday, days after a deadly attack by Islamist militants in neighboring Algeria.

Britain cited a "specific and imminent" threat to Westerners in Libya's second largest city, but officials declined to give any details.

Spiegel, citing sources in the German Federal Intelligence Service (BND), said on Sunday al Qaeda and other militant Islamist groups were specifically preparing attacks on British and German citizens in the area.

It gave no further details and the BND declined to comment.

On Thursday, German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle described the situation in Benghazi, cradle of the uprising that ousted Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, as "serious and delicate" but also declined to provide any details.

The call to leave Benghazi irked Libyans, keen to win foreign investment to rebuild their fractured infrastructure and boost the oil industry after the revolution against Gaddafi.

Few Westerners are believed to be in Benghazi, which has experienced a wave of violence against diplomats as well as military and police officers, including an attack in September that killed the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans.

At least 38 hostages were killed in an attack on Algeria's In Amenas gas complex near the Libyan border earlier this month. The launch of France's military operations in Mali has also cranked up tensions in North Africa.

Fears Grow That Libya Is Incubator of Turmoil

Abdel Hakim Belhaj, the former Al-Qaeda commander whose LIFG terrorist organization had killed U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Πηγή: abcNews
By MAGGIE MICHAEL, AP
Jan 26 2013

Libya's upheaval the past two years helped lead to the ongoing conflict in Mali, and now Mali's war threatens to wash back and further hike Libya's instability. Fears are growing that post-Moammar Gadhafi Libya is becoming an incubator of turmoil, with an overflow of weapons and Islamic jihadi militants operating freely, ready for battlefields at home or abroad.

The possibility of a Mali backlash was underlined the past week when several European governments evacuated their citizens from Libya's second largest city, Benghazi, fearing attacks in retaliation for the French-led military assault against al-Qaida-linked extremists in northern Mali.

More worrisome is the possibility that Islamic militants inspired by — or linked to — al-Qaida can establish a strong enough foothold in Libya to spread instability across a swath of North Africa where long, porous desert borders have little meaning, governments are weak, and tribal and ethnic networks stretch from country to country. The Associated Press examined the dangers in recent interviews with officials, tribal leaders and jihadis in various parts of Libya.

Already, Libya's turmoil echoes around the region and in the Middle East. The large numbers of weapons brought into Libya or seized from government caches during the 2011 civil war against Gadhafi are now smuggled freely to Mali, Egypt and its Sinai Peninsula, the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip and to rebels fighting Syrian President Bashar Assad. Jihadis in Libya are believed to have operational links with fellow militant groups in the same swath, Libyan fighters have joined rebels in Syria and are believed to operate in other countries as well.

Libyan officials, activists and experts are increasingly raising alarm over how Islamic militants have taken advantage of the oil-rich country's weakness to grow in strength. During his more than four-decade rule Gadhafi stripped the country of national institutions, and after his fall the central government has little authority beyond the capital, Tripoli. Militias established to fight Gadhafi remain dominant, and tribes and regions are sharply divided.

In the eastern city of Benghazi, birthplace of the revolt that led to the ouster and killing of Gadhafi, militias espousing an al-Qaida ideology and including veteran fighters are prevalent, even ostensibly serving as security forces on behalf of the government since the police and military are so weak and poorly armed. One such militia, Ansar al-Shariah, is believed to have been behind the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. Consulate in the city that killed four Americans, including the ambassador. Since then, militants have been blamed for a wave of assassinations of security officers and government officials.

Earlier this month, former Libyan leader Mustafa Abdul-Jalil warned the militant threat extends to efforts to establish a state that can enforce rule of law.

"Libya will not see stability except by facing them," he told a gathering videotaped by activists and aired on Libyan TV. "It is time to either hold dialogue or confront them." He listed 30 officials and police officers assassinated in Benghazi the past year.

The Mali drama illustrates how the threat bounces back and forth across the borders drawn in the Sahel, the region stretching across the Sahara Desert. Libya and Mali are separated by Algeria, but the two countries had deep ties under Gadhafi. Thousands of Tuaregs moved from Mali to Libya beginning in the 1970s, and many joined special divisions of Gadhafi's military where they earned higher salaries than they would have at home.

As Gadhafi was falling in 2011, thousands of heavily armed Tuareg fighters in southern Libya fled to northern Mali. The Tuareg are an indigenous ethnic group living throughout the Sahel, from Mali to Chad and into Libya and Algeria.

The fighters, led by commander Mohammed Ag Najem, broke the Mali government's hold over the north and declared their long-held dream of a Tuareg homeland, Azawad. But they in turn were defeated by Islamic militants, some linked to al-Qaida's branch in North Africa, who took over the territory and imposed rule under an extreme version of Shariah, or Islamic law. This month, as militants moved south, France launched its military intervention to rescue the Mali government, conducting airstrikes against militants.

In retaliation, militants seized an oil complex in eastern Algeria, prompting a siege by Algerian forces that killed dozens of Western hostages and militants.

The militant group that carried out the Algeria hostage taking, in turn, had help from Libyan extremists in the form of smuggled weapons and "organizational ties," the group's leader, Moktar Belmoktar said.

"Their ideological and organizational connection to us is not an accusation against a Muslim but a source of pride and honor to us and to them," Belmoktar, the one-eyed Algerian founder of the Masked Brigade, said of the Libyans in an interview with The Mauritanian newspaper in mid-December. "Jihadists in al-Qaida and in general were the biggest beneficiaries of the Arab world uprisings, because these uprisings have broken the chains of fear ... that the agent regimes of the West imposed."

He urged Libyan militants not to submit to calls by the Tripoli government to hand over their weapons, saying their arms are "the source of their dignity and their guarantee of security."

With pressure building on Mali's Islamists, Libya provides a possible alternative haven for jihadis, said Scott Stewart of the global intelligence group Stratfor.

"It is a very good place to operate if you are an extremist," he said. "There are fault lines and divisions ... The central government has very little authority outside Tripoli. This is very conducive environment for Jihad to thrive."

They already have a free rein in Benghazi.

"Libya became a heaven for them," Col. Salah Bouhalqa, a leading military commander in Benghazi, said of al-Qaida. "The Westerners are fearful that what happened in Algeria will take place in Libya. And here, just like Mali and Egypt and Iraq, these groups have extensions."

Some extremists say they are determined to shape the new Libya. Youssef Jihani, a member of Ansar Shariah in Benghazi, vowed that he and other jihadis would not accept a return to the days when they were jailed and executed under Gadhafi's rule. He told the AP in Benghazi late last year that the toppling of Gadhafi would not have been possible without the strength of jihadi fighters who he said joined the uprising to ensure an "Islamic state of Libya, where Shariah rule is implemented."

The bearded young man said he lay down his weapons last year. But he said he would take arms up again if Libya's next constitution doesn't make a clear reference to rule by Islamic law or if secular politicians hold power and try to rein in jihadis.

Jihani proudly said he believes in al-Qaida and supports its slain leader Osama bin Laden and Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Omar. He said that during Libya's civil war in 2011, he killed a captured soldier from Gadhafi's army after discovering 11 video clips on his mobile phone showing soldiers raping women and men. Jihani said he ordered the soldier to dig his own grave, then severed his head with a knife.

"I wish I could behead him 11 times," he said. His story could not be independently confirmed.

Stewart, of Stratfor, also pointed to a concern that al-Qaida could make inroads among Libya's impoverished and alienated Tuareg.

Living in mud-brick slums or camps in the deserts of southwestern Libya, most Tuaregs were never given citizenship under Gadhafi's rule, though he used their fighters as mercenaries, and now they suffer not only from poverty but from the disdain of Libyans who see them as Gadhafi loyalists.

For centuries, Tuareg ran caravan routes across the Sahara, carrying gold and other valuables. Now they're known for smuggling weapons and drugs. In slums around the towns of Sabha and Owbari, they sleep next to livestock in shacks with corrugated metal roofs, with webs of electric cables dangling from poles overhead and garbage-filled streets.

Libya's new leadership has largely shunned them. The Tuareg's four members in parliament were removed because of ties to Gadhafi's regime, leaving them without a political voice. The Tuareg contend they were exploited by Gadhafi, along with all other Libyans.

"Gadhafi's rule left behind a breeding ground for terrorism by depriving people of their rights and education .... After all the promises, we thought we will live in heaven, but kids here die from scorpion bites," said Suleiman Naaim, a Tuareg rights activist, told the AP in Owbari.

The Energy Industry is Not Safe in North Africa

Πηγή: Oilprice
jan 25 2013

Energy interests sector-wide should be prepared for the coming security nightmare that is the Sahel. At a time when even the juniors have become unaccountably brave in frontier regions, the hostage crisis in Algeria demonstrates just how vulnerable the industry is.

It is vulnerable both to the whims of Western military intervention and to Salafi jihadist moves to take advantage of a transnational opening that would have been unheard of with Gaddafi, Mubarak and Assad still in control in Libya, Egypt and Syria.

The hostage crisis at the BP-operated Amenas gas field in the Algerian Sahara was most interesting because it was the result of a militant leadership feud. It was a challenge from one leader to another, and that challenge will have to be met with something equally spectacular. It was also a message to the French about their unexpected intervention in Mali. More attacks on energy installations and Western personnel are likely to come elsewhere in the Sahel, and no amount of high-tech security will prevent them.

In total, we are talking about more than one million square kilometers of ungoverned desert in the Sahel and a French military intervention that will shift them away from Mali and toward other borders to refocus. French interests and citizens will be the primary (and already declared) targets, but Europeans in general will become increasingly profitable kidnapping victims.

Conflict in Mali

The Mali military staged a coup in March 2012--one month before presidential elections. They ousted President Amadou Toumani Toure on the pretext that his administration had failed to deal with the Tuareg, who have been pursuing independence for “Azawad” (Northern Mali) since the 1960s.

The coup leader was Pentagon favorite Amadou Haya Sanogo, who was trained in the US and by AFRICOM and was viewed in Washington as a strong ally in the fight against terrorism and particularly against the solidifying interests of AQIM (al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb). The coup left a security vacuum that allowed the Tuareg room to make a power play.

This came at a good time for the Tuareg, who had lost a major support base with the death of Libyan leader Muammer Gaddafi. In March, on the heels of the coup, the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA—a secular Tuareg outfit) took over some key government buildings in Gao (in Northern Mali). In April, they announced the creation of independent Azawad. But their victory was elusive and they were soon sidelined by three Islamist groups: Ansar al-Din (an Islamist Tuareg outfit), MUJAW and AQIM, both foreign terrorist groups.

French Special Forces arrived on the scene in March and the UN sanctioned military action. North African nations failed to move on this, leaving any military effort up to the French, while the US monitored the situation from neighboring borders (Burkina Faso and Mauritania).

In June, the MNLA were forced out by MUJAW (whose fighters are almost all former AQIM), and MUJAW took over Gao and imposed an extremely hardline form of Sharia law.

In January 2013, the French sent an initial 1,400 troops into Mali to launch an offensive supported by air strikes. The French were warned that the offensive would push militants into Algeria.

The French intervened when Ansar al-Din seized control of the town of Konna in the second week of January 2013. The French justification was to stop the Islamists from taking control of the rest of Mali. Konna in technically in the north of Mali, but it lies in the central buffer zone between north and south.

This was a flawed justification. Ansar al-Din is interested in taking control of the north, not the south, and its move on Konna was most likely intended only to measure the Mali Army’s response. Ansar al-Din does not have the capability or support (even with the help of the foreign terrorist groups) to take over the south of the country. Nor is that a likely agenda.

These militant Islamist Tuareg are natural enemies of the foreign terrorist groups (AQIM and MUJAW) and their temporary alliance is one only of convenience. Once Ansar al-Din secures its northern territory, it will summarily reject AQIM and MUJAW and likely turn on them.

Ansar al-Din views itself as defending its own territory. They are Tuareg. They are Malians. AQIM and MUJAB are foreigners and they have no territory to defend and will find themselves boxed in in Northern Mali, when traditionally they rely on mobility for their cause. The premature French military action will push AQIM and MUJAW militants to areas of the Sahel/Sahara outside of Mali and thus the crisis will spread.

AQIM, MUJAW and Ansar al-Din cooperated with each other to seize control of northern Mali last year, but since then cooperation has only been sporadic. The only other demonstration of cooperation was on 10 January, when the three launched a joint offensive against the Malian Army. It is important that there is the illusion of a united front—but it will not last. Not only are AQIM and MUJAW struggling with an insurgency leadership question, Ansar al-Din is Tuareg and has an entirely different agenda.

AQIM and Ansar al-Din are at odds over AQIM’s smuggling activities, and these three groups—along with a number of other groups—are also suffering from racial infighting among Black Africans and Arabs. Already, Ansar al-Din is showing signs that it may rescind plans for Sharia law in the north, which is HIGHLY unpopular among the Tuareg.

The leader of Ansar al-Din—Iyad ag Ghali--is under a great deal of pressure from his own tribe, the Ifoghas, to cut all ties with AQIM and MUJAW. This pressure has risen exponentially since the imposition of Sharia law in some areas of Northern Mali. Ghali is also be courted heavily by the secular MNLA, of which he is a former member, as well as Algerian intelligence officials and meditators from Burkina Faso.

The Algerian Hostage Crisis

On 15 January, a group of militants (about 40-strong) entered the Algerian Sahara via Libya and attacked a BP-operated gas field (Amenas) some 100 kilometers from the Libyan border, in a very remote stretch of desert. They took some 700 hostages. On 15-16 January, some 600 hostages were freed, but many of those were believed to have been freed by the militants themselves shortly before a raid by the Algerian Special Forces. On 16 January, Algerian Special Forces launched a three-day rescue operation. At least 60 hostages were killed in the helicopter, including at least 7 Western nationals. A total of 6 militants were captured alive.

This spectacular attack was not about Algeria, and only secondarily about the French intervention in Mali. It was first and foremost about making a power play to resolve a simmering leadership dispute among the Salafi jihadists over the Sahel.

No ransoms were sought, no hostages were executed, nor were the BP-operated Amenas gas facilities wantonly destroyed or sabotaged. It was an extremely high-profile publicity stunt designed to send this message: Mokhtar Belmokhtar is the unquestionable leader of the Salafi jihadist movement. He has managed to launch a surprise attack on a high-security Western gas field and take hundreds of hostages on the territory of Algeria—which is, significantly, the stomping ground of his key leadership rival. The secondary message—which was also necessary for the overall, incontrovertibly united goals of the Salafi jihadists in the Sahel—was a warning to the French over their intervention in Mali.

It is this leadership struggle that will best help us to predict where the next attack might take place, and how these parallel objectives will affect security across the Sahel and beyond—to Egypt and Syria.

The media has tended to attribute the hostage incident to AQIM, as this is something the Western public is familiar with and it suits further “war on terror” ambitions. However, the attack was not conducted by AQIM, rather by MUJAW, a relatively new creation comprised of former AQIM fighters and a mix of Black African Islamists. More specifically still, the attack was led by Belmokhtar, the historical leader of AQIM who split from the group only in October 2012 over a leadership dispute.

What concerns us most urgently is that Belmokhtar’s leadership rival, Abdelmakbel Droukdel, must rise to the challenge and respond with an equally spectacular attack that is still in line with the message to the French.

Beware—Libya, Niger and Mauritania

While most attention is presently on the security situation in Algeria, this may be misplaced. Algeria is the most secure of all the Sahel countries and its security forces have significantly greater capabilities. We would be more inclined to expect another terrorist attack outside of Algeria—for instance, in Libya, Niger, or Mauritania.

Libya will be the most affected, and that is fitting as this is where it all began. Unilateral French intervention led to a NATO-level conflict that effectively destabilized the entire Sahel and opened up windows of opportunity for Islamic militant groups—opportunities that have never existed before.

Libya remains a security nightmare, awash with roving militias, some of them understood to be “friendly”, working for, but not controlled by the government, others waiting for another opportunity to regroup, such as the chaos in Mali may provide. Those “friendly” Islamic militias also comprised the security team protecting the US consulate in Benghazi when it came under attack on 11 September 2012.

The violence in Mali has already sparked off a string of threats in Libya, with security forces claiming to have intercepted vehicle-borne explosive devices at the Benghazi airport before they could be detonated. Militant threats in retaliation for the French intervention in Mali have specifically listed hotels catering to foreigners across the country, but to a higher degree in Benghazi. Western diplomats remain a specific target. The Italian consul in Benghazi narrowly survived a drive-by shooting on 12 January.

After Libya, Niger is the most vulnerable to what will now be a spread of Salafi jihadist activity and kidnapping across the Sahel. It is most vulnerable because it is the poorest and its government lacks structure. Corruption among the security forces is extremely high, and there is evidence of individual security force collusion in kidnappings of foreigners.

This is also another likely theater for direct intervention by France because of French uranium interests here. Niger provides a significant amount of the uranium France uses in its nuclear reactors, and these uranium facilities should be on high alert.

Particularly in Niger, the kidnapping networks are dangerous and kidnappings are often conducted by third parties interested only in selling foreigners to AQIM or MUJAW—the two key terrorist groups in the region. This makes the kidnapping network immediately larger, and recruitment irrelevant. There is no ideological requirement. Locals looking to profit from this business will note the renewed momentum of the Salafi jihadist movements due to events in Mali and Algeria, and they will be seeking to take advantage of that momentum.

Inside the Ring: CIA in Benghazi

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton testifies on Capitol Hill on Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2013, before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks against the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya.

Πηγή: The Washington Times
By Bill Gertz
Jan 23 2013

Congressional testimony from Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Wednesday provided no new information about the CIA’s covert operation in Benghazi involving weapons shipments.

Appearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee during a hearing on the deadly Sept. 11 Benghazi terrorist attack, she sidestepped questions about a CIA operation to send arms from Libya to Turkey or other countries in the region.

The CIA was operating a compound with more than a dozen operatives about a mile from the diplomatic outpost that was attacked by al Qaeda-linked terrorists, who killed four Americans, including U.S. Ambassador to Libya J. Christopher Stephens. Two contractors from the CIA compound who tried to rescue the ambassador were among the dead.

Sen. Rand Paul, Kentucky Republican, asked Mrs. Clinton if “the U.S. [is] involved with any procuring of weapons, transfer of weapons, buying, selling, anyhow transferring weapons to Turkey out of Libya?”

A surprised Mrs. Clinton initially responded: “To Turkey?”

“I will have to take that question for the record,” she said. “That’s — I — nobody’s ever raised that with me.”

Mr. Paul said news reports indicated that ships had left Libya that might be carrying weapons.

“And what I’d like to know is — the annex that was close by — were they involved with procuring, buying, selling, obtaining weapons, and were any of these weapons being transferred to other countries, any countries, Turkey included?” he asked.

Mrs. Clinton said: “Well, senator, you’ll have to direct that question to the agency that ran the annex, and I will see what information is available.”

“You’re saying you don’t know?” Mr. Paul asked.

“I do not know. I don’t have any information on that,” she responded.

Details of the CIA operation could not be learned. A U.S. official said the operation was set up last year to try to procure or control weapons that could be used by terrorists that had been taken from the armed forces of the former regime of Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

A U.S. military official said the new Libyan regime was very supportive of Syria’s rebels fighting the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Watching Hagel reaction

U.S. intelligence agencies have been monitoring international reaction to the nomination of former Sen. Chuck Hagel to be the next secretary of defense. What the monitoring shows is that Iran and China are favoring a Hagel-led Pentagon, while officials in Israel are viewing the prospect with concern.

Israeli officials are particularly concerned that the nomination of the Nebraska Republican, as well as Sen. John F. Kerry, Massachusetts Democrat, to be secretary of state, will increase tensions between the United States and its key ally in the Middle East.

In particular, the Israelis view the choice of Mr. Hagel to head the Pentagon as the first step in President Obama’s new, softer policy toward Iran. As for Mr. Kerry, the Israelis fear his running of U.S. foreign policy will result in more pressure on Israel regarding the Palestinians and West Bank settlement activity.

Israeli officials have been cautious in on-the-record comments about Mr. Hagel.

Avi Dichter, Israel’s home front minister, was asked by Voice of Israel radio earlier this month about Mr. Hagel and said: “We wish him well.” Privately, Israeli officials are pessimistic, with one telling a newspaper, “This is very bad news for Israel.”

The Israelis are worried that Mr. Hagel and Mr. Kerry will make it difficult for Israel to take military action against Iran’s nuclear facilities. Both nominees object to military strikes on Iran.

By contrast, Iran’s government cautiously welcomed the Hagel nomination. Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast voiced limited optimism on an Iranian Facebook page about Mr. Hagel taking over the Pentagon.

U.S. officials say the positive tone coming from Tehran suggests a greater chance of U.S.-Iran talks this year. Iranian enthusiasm for Mr. Hagel contrasts with the appointments of two predecessors, Leon E. Panetta and Robert M. Gates, whose nominations were met with silence from Tehran.

Iranian media reports also welcomed Mr. Hagel for his anti-Israel views and for his opposition to military attacks on Iran. They see Mr. Hagel as defense secretary as a further deterioration in relations between the Obama administration and the government Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who won re-election this week.

Mr. Mehmanparast told reporters in Tehran that Mr. Hagel could be a sign of “practical changes in U.S. foreign policy.” However, he added that Iran does not place stock in official U.S. statements because in the past they did not translate into action. The state-run IRNA news agency called the secretary-designate someone “known for pro-Iran and anti-Zionist views.”

In Beijing, the state-controlled press also welcomed the nomination of Mr. Hagel.

The China Daily reported in early January that Mr. Hagel was facing a tough confirmation fight in Congress but “appears willing to work with China.”

Shen Dingli, a professor at the government-controlled Institute of International Studies at Fudan University in Shanghai was quoted as saying: “I see Chuck Hagel is a good candidate. He had the honesty to oppose the Iraq War — a moderate and respectful Republican.”

The People’s Daily, the official Communist Party newspaper, said Mr. Hagel “repeatedly opposed sanctions against China as senator.”

“If Hagel serves as secretary of defense, it will to some extent boost the strength of rational pragmatists in the Obama administration,” Yuan Zheng, a researcher at the state-run Institute of American Studies, was quoted in the newspaper as saying.

Terrorists linked to al Qaeda who attacked a natural gas plant in Algeria last week relied on insiders at the facility as part of the plot, according to a report by an Algerian news outlet.

A report in Ennahar el-Djadid Online, based in Algiers, quoted Mokhtar Belmokhtar — who was identified as the “emir” of the Signed-in-Blood Battalion — as saying he used “former spies” who had been employed on short-term contracts from the British company BP in the attack on the facility.

The insiders worked as drivers, cooks and guards at the gas plant and provided intelligence on the entrances and exits as well as the residence complex, the guard system and details of buildings, the news outlet reported.

The Pentagon has said the attack, which killed some 37 hostages and 29 terrorists, appears to have been an operation of the group al Qaeda in the Ilsamic Maghreb (AQIM), the North African affiliate of the terrorist group.

“When it comes to terrorist attacks of this sort in North Africa, AQIM has to be at the top of the list of suspects, I’ll put it that way,” Pentagon press secretary George Little told reporters Tuesday.

Anti-Brotherhood protest set

Opponents of Egypt’s Islamist Muslim Brotherhood government are planning a protest this week and are mobilizing forces seeking to oust the administration of President Mohammed Morsi.

The protest is being organized by an informal coalition of opposition groups using Facebook and other social media to mobilize Egyptians for the action.

The opposition is opposing the Muslim Brotherhood and Mr. Morsi, who is affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood.

According to U.S. officials, more than 50 Facebook pages critical of the Brotherhood have been set up in the past several months.

A key theme of the Facebook protesters is that the Brotherhood is backed by foreign interests, and that Mr. Morsi is an agent of Western powers that seek to destroy Egypt.

According to the protesters’ online postings, demonstrations planned for Thursday are expected to turn out thousands of Egyptians and may spark violence.

The groups opposing the current government include a pro-Egyptian military group and public employees who claim the Brotherhood’s radical policies are harming the economy.

Some opponents alleged that Mr. Morsi was recruited by the CIA while teaching in California and that Egypt has received $1.5 billion in U.S. aid to support American policies.