A Mauritanian Salafist who once benefited from a presidential pardon is in prison once again after refusing to renounce his jihadist ideology.Perhaps this is why Hamas won't move to Mauritania...
A Mauritanian court on Tuesday (January 3rd) sent eight Salafists to prison on multiple terror charges, including recruitment.
The convicts include prominent Salafist ideologue Mohamed Salem Ould Mohamed Lemine, also known as Almajlissi, who once benefited from a presidential pardon.
The men were part of a group of 17 suspects picked up last November in a security sweep ahead of Mauritanian Army Day celebrations. The Nouakchott court ordered two other suspects placed under judicial control while the remaining seven were released.
Almajlissi was "one of the leading Jihadist-Salafist ideologues in Mauritania", according to analyst Sidi Mohamed Ould Lakhlifa. "He benefited from a presidential pardon in 2010, together with a group of 43 other defendants who were released after they took part in dialogue with a group of faqihs in co-ordination with Mauritanian authorities."
"After they were released, they even benefited from money grants in the form of gifts and loans to help re-integrate them into life. Meanwhile, Almajlissi refused to receive such assistance because he saw it as a reward for backing down on ideas he had embraced; something which he refused," the analyst added.
Abdullah Ould Mohamed Sidia, a spokesperson for a group of Salafists who benefited from the presidential pardon, said that Almajlissi refused to take part in dialogue with other prisoners, insisting on talks with scholars alone.
"Almajlissi and another group at prison had different ideas from ours, as they had extremist ideas about the takfir of others. His differences with us made him refuse to take part in dialogue with us," he added.
In addition to Almajlissi, another prominent defendant was Sidi Ould Habbot, alias Abu Obeida. He was one of the first Mauritanians to join the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) in 2004 before it changed its name to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), according to Aslam Ould Mustafa, director of the Tahalil website and a terrorism analyst.
"If the dismantlement of this cell is not part of the usual security precautions, it confirms that the terrorist threat is no longer restricted to northern Mali alone, but is now threatening Mauritania as well," Ould Mustafa added.