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Key Qaeda Militant Killed In Algeria
[AFP] A bad turban charged with liaising between Al-Qaeda and its North African branch Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) has been killed in an ambush by Algerian forces, security officials said on Sunday.Boualem Bekai, who was known as Khaled El Mig, was killed on Friday at Azrou some 50 kilometres (30 miles) from the blood-stained Tizi Ouzou region east of the capital, the APS news agency cited the officials as saying. His identity was confirmed on Sunday by his family who collected his body from the hospital at blood-stained Tizi Ouzou, the sources said. The 45-year-old AQIM member became an Islamist bad turban at the beginning of the country's civil war in the 1990s. His group is suspected of being behind several attacks in the region, including an April 2011 assault on an Algerian military barracks at Azazga near blood-stained Tizi Ouzou that killed 14 soldiers. The Azazga guard post is on the edge of the dense Yakouren forest, where AQIM is active. AQIM, headed by Abdelmalik Droukdel ... aka Abdel Wadoud, was a regional leader of the GSPC for several years before becoming the group's supremo in 2004 following the death of then-leader Nabil Sahraoui. Under Abdel Wadoud's leadership the GSPC has sought to develop itself from a largely domestic entity into a larger player on the international terror stage. In September 2006 it was announced that the GSPC had joined forces with al-Qaeda and in January 2007 the group officially changed its name to the Al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb.... , emerged in early 2007 from an Algerian armed Islamist movement, the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat ... now known as al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb... . It operates in several northwestern African countries, including Mali, Mauritania and Niger. The group has since been boosted by the turmoil in neighbouring Mali that followed a coup there in March, with hardline Islamists occupying the country's vast northern region. Posted by: trailing wife 2012-10-16 |
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