al Qaeda - The African Mirror

Apr

2024

US sanctions militant leaders over hostages in West Africa

THE U.S. imposed sanctions on leaders of militant groups over the taking of hostages, including Americans, in West Africa, the Treasury and State departments said. WHY IT'S IMPORTANT The sanctions on leaders of the West African branch of al Qaeda, called Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimeen (JNIM), and Islamist militant group Al-Mourabitoun come as Washington has sought to deter and punish detentions of U.S. citizens abroad. West African countries have been destabilized in recent years by Islamist insurgencies that took root in Mali in 2012 and spread across the Sahel region despite costly, international backed-military efforts. KEY QUOTES "We will not hesitate…

Apr

2024

By OPE ADETAYO

African leaders call for rethink on tackling violent extremism

NEWS

AFRICAN leaders at a security summit in Nigeria called for a revamp of institutions fighting violent extremism on the continent and the setting up of a standby military force and greater control over peace-keeping efforts. Groups linked to Islamic State and al Qaeda have been carrying out routine attacks in Africa, including the Sahel, Somalia and Mozambique, targeting civilians and the military. Togolese President Faure Gnassingbe said while the Sahel suffered the most attacks on civilians, coastal states like Togo were facing growing threats. "I say this with prudence and regret, but I think the institutions that have been in…

Nov

2023

By The African Mirror

Burkina Faso junta’s conscription of critics rattles civil society and unions

NEWS

BURKINA Faso's military junta is abusing an emergency law to conscript perceived dissidents and critics to join a deadly fight against militants linked to Al Qaeda and Islamic State, warned lawyers, journalists and watchdog Human Rights Watch this week. In a series of statements, civil society groups and unions for journalists and lawyers accused the junta of seeking to silence peaceful dissent as it struggled to contain the security crisis as promised when it seized power in a September 2022 coup. "We see that it (the junta) is revealing its true face and that it has not necessarily come to…

Sep

2023

By The African Mirror

Suicide bomber kills at least 7 in Somali tea shop; al Shabaab claims responsibility

NEWS

A suicide bomber set off an explosion at a shop selling tea in Somalia's capital, killing at least seven people, a witness and medical personnel. Police put the number of dead at five. Al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab group claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement on its Arabic media unit Shahada News Agency, the SITE Intelligence Group reported on Friday. It put the number of dead at 11 and wounded at 18; its numbers on casualties in attacks often differ from government figures. The Friday afternoon blast occurred at a checkpoint on a road leading to the parliament and…

Feb

2023

By The African Mirror

Al Qaeda’s new leader Adel has $10 million bounty on his head

NEWS

MICHAEL GEORGY SEIF al-Adel, a former Egyptian special forces officer who is a high-ranking member of al Qaeda with a $10 million U.S. bounty on his head, is now the "uncontested" leader of the militant group, according to a new U.N. report on the organisation. Al Qaeda has not formally named a successor for Ayman al-Zawahiri, who was believed to have been killed in a U.S. missile strike in Kabul last year, dealing a blow to the organisation since its founder Osama bin Laden was killed in 2011.Advertisement · Scroll to continue Although a U.S. intelligence official said in January that Zawahiri's succession remained…

Jan

2023

By The African Mirror

60 abducted Burkinabe women freed

NEWS

THIAM NDIAGA SIXTY-SIX women and children kidnapped by armed assailants in northern Burkina Faso last week have been freed, national broadcaster Radiodiffusion Télévision du Burkina (RTP) said. The mass kidnapping was unprecedented in Burkina Faso, which is facing a violent Islamist insurgency that spread from neighbouring Mali in 2015. On 12 and 13 January, armed men seized the women and their children while they were scouring the bush for fruit and leaves outside two villages in the district of Arbinda, in the Sahel region's Soum province. Security forces staged a rescue operation and found 27 adult women and 39 babies, children and…

Jan

2023

By The African Mirror

Militants kidnap 50 women in Burkina Faso

NEWS

THIAM NDIAGA ISLAMIST militants kidnapped around 50 women searching for food in Burkina Faso's northern province of Soum, a hotbed of jihadist activity, on January 12 and 13, the government said. The mass kidnapping is a first in the insurgency that spread to Burkina Faso from neighbouring Mali in 2015 despite costly international military efforts to contain it. While Westerners and locals are occasionally captured, women had not previously been abducted in such numbers. Mass kidnappings have been carried out in Nigeria by the separate Boko Haram insurgency there. Armed men seized the women as they were picking wild fruit…

Jan

2023

By The African Mirror

Car bombs kill 35, burn houses in central Somalia

NEWS

ABDI SHEIKH TWO car bombs detonated by al Shabaab militants in central Somalia killed at least 35 people, including eight members of a single family, and wounded 40 more, a senior police officer said. The attack in the town of Mahas was the latest in a series by al Qaeda affiliate al Shabaab since government forces and allied clan militias last year began pushing the insurgents out of territory they had long held. "Most of the dead are civilians. They are women and children," Hassan-Kafi Mohamed Ibrahim, deputy police commissioner of Hirshabelle State, told Reuters. "Only one child survived from…

Jul

2022

By The African Mirror

Militants attack Mali’s main military base, situation ‘under control’

NEWS

FADIMATA KONTAO ISLAMIST militants struck Mali's main military base, just outside the capital Bamako, in a complex attack involving car bombs, but the armed forces said they had repelled the assault and had the situation under control. Militants linked to al Qaeda and Islamic State have repeatedly raided bases across Mali during a decade-long insurgency concentrated in the north and centre but never so close to Bamako in the south. Heavy gunfire rang out for about an hour early on Friday at the Kati camp, about 15 km (10 miles) northwest of Bamako. A convoy carrying the leader of Mali's…

Jul

2022

By The African Mirror

U.S. says it killed two al Shabaab militants in Somalia airstrike

NEWS

THE U.S. military said it had killed two fighters from the al Shabaab militant group in an airstrike in a remote part of Somalia's southern Jubaland state on Sunday. The United States has been carrying out air strikes in Somalia to try to defeat al Shabaab, an al Qaeda franchise seeking to implement its interpretation of Islamic law and overthrow the country's Western-backed central government. The strike took place near Libikus in the Lower Juba region, U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) said in a statement late on Monday. "The command's initial assessment is that two al Shabaab terrorists were killed in…