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GSPC shifting fighters to Europe to save them from US counterterrorism efforts in Africa
Al-Qaida's biggest ally in Africa is faltering in its efforts to transform the Sahara into an Afghanistan-style terror haven. But a critical mass of operatives has emerged in Italy, with ample resources and a broad shadow network primed to strike civilians across Europe.Three Algerian members of the Salafist Group for Call and Combat, an Algeria-based terror group cited on the U.S. State Department's list of foreign terror organizations, were arrested last December by authorities in southern Italy and charged with planning attacks on civilians, according to Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu. More than $22 million was reportedly found in a vehicle used by the cell, which was preparing to target ships, stadiums and railway stations in a bid to trump the Sept. 11, 2001 al-Qaida attacks against the United States. Phone conversations intercepted by police contained discussions to kill "at least 10,000 people and blow up a vessel "as big as the Titanic," Pisanu said, a plot foretold by a GSPC statement four days after the 2001 attack, pledging its commitment to Osama bin-Laden's terror franchise and threatening to harm "the interests of European countries and the U.S." The GSPC, once estimated to have some 300 members in Algeria, was formed in the late 1990s to topple the government and create an Islamic state. Militants carried out a series of successful attacks last summer that reportedly killed 40 soldiers in remote parts of Algeria and Mauritania, but Algerian authorities have since cracked down and gained the upper hand. The latest GSPC offensive, a Dec. 24 bombing in Dellys, a northeast Algerian port, caused only one casualty. Three high-ranking GSPC officials surrendered two days later and reportedly called on remaining militants to do the same, echoing the words of founder and former leader Hassan Hattab, who gave up the gun last September. And just two weeks ago, Ahmed Zerabib, another founder and religious guru of the group was confirmed dead after a clash with the Algerian army. But while the GSPC's operational capacity may be drying up in the desert, the group's "emphasis on 'out-of-algeria' terrorist operations has made it the largest, most cohesive and dangerous terrorist organization in the al-Qaida orbit," according to a new report released by the Jamestown Foundation, a Washington based think tank. The report says Italy has "evolved from a logistics base" to a "de facto base of operations" for GSPC activities targeting Europe. The Italian network -- spanning Venice to Naples -- is said to be composed primarily of first-generation residents born in Algeria who immigrated to establish support cells for the ongoing insurgency in their homeland. Algerian GSPC operatives based out of a Milan mosque were first arrested in 2002 for illegally acquiring explosives and weapons. In 2005, Italian police detained five of 11 Algerians suspected of belonging to the GSPC and investigated their involvement in a failed terrorist attack against the Spanish National Court in Madrid, among other incidents. "GSPC cells in Italy employ a dual-track approach to planning terrorist attacks and provide support infrastructure -- safe houses, communications, weapons... and (forged documents) to cells elsewhere in Europe. "Although the cells appear to be composed exclusively of Algerian Salafi jihadists," the report says, "their interaction with mixed Moroccan and Algerian cells in Spain, Norway and other countries demonstrates that the desire for global jihad has overcome the historical animosity between these two national groups." Spanish authorities arrested 20 suspected terrorists Jan. 12 in Barcelona and Madrid, including Moroccan-born Omar Nackhcha, the head of a GSPC cell said to recruit and give logistical support to Iraq-bound militants and suicide bombers. A spokesman for Spain's Interior Ministry said one of the group's recruits was responsible for a suicide attack in November 2003 in Nasiriyah, Iraq, that killed 19 Italians and 9 Iraqis. Nackhcha is also thought to have led another terrorist cell that helped the escape of three suspects in the 2004 Madrid train bombings that killed 191 persons. Elsewhere, French authorities arrested 11 suspects last January with ties to the GSPC and charged them with recruiting suicide bombers to send to Iraq. In September, police seized three other Algerians affiliated with the group who were accused of preparing to bomb the Paris Metro. Western intelligence agencies estimate the GSPC has an exile network of 800 to 900 active operatives and supporters spread throughout Europe, where arrests have also been made in Belgium, Britain, Norway and the Netherlands. Authorities fear the GSPC may hold a growing appeal to the thousands of estranged young Muslims that idle at the fringes of major European cities. U.S. military officials, for their part, still insist that lawless swaths of Saharan Africa, coupled with high unemployment and swelling frustration with corrupt governments, gives the region significant "potential for instability" -- particularly since 50 percent of the population is younger than 15. Concerned the area could become the "next Afghanistan," the U.S. kicked off a seven-year, $500 million counter-terrorism initiative to provide military expertise, equipment and developmental aid to nine North and West African countries considered fertile ground for the GSPC and other jihadist groups to recruit and train militants. But a recent report by the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think tank, said the Sahara is "not a terrorist hotbed," and warned that heavy-handed U.S. military and financial support of authoritarian regimes could backfire. Posted by: Dan Darling 2006-02-19 |
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