Nigerian Elite Force Accused of Murders in Plateau State

Posted on January 28, 2011 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

January 28, 2011

Ongoing violence in Nigeria’s mixed Christian-Muslim Plateau State took a new turn when an elite force of Nigerian troops tasked with restoring order were accused of attacks on civilians in two Christian villages that killed eight, creating a new national scandal as the country approaches general elections in April. Over 100 people have been killed in the region surrounding the state capital of Jos since Christmas.

Brigadier Hassan Umaru

The government’s response to the violence was Operation Safe Haven, a campaign to be implemented by a Special Military Task Force (STF) drawing on members of the army, navy, air force and police. The STF is led by Brigadier-General Hassan Umaru, whose wife is believed to have been killed by attackers last month (NigerianNewsService.com, December 7, 2010).

On the night of January 24 the villages of Hamman and Farin Lamba (both roughly 25 km from the state capital of Jos) were attacked by uniformed gunmen who assaulted villagers with machetes and firearms (Next [Lagos], January 25). The attackers in Farin Lamba were observed arriving and leaving in a Toyota Hilux van of the type used to transport police in the region, an observation later confirmed by Plateau State Police Commissioner Abdurrahman Akano. Many of the attackers appeared to be wearing body armor of the type worn by security forces. However, Commissioner Akano also suggested that the reported theft of 100 cattle belonging to Fulanis was the cause of what he termed “a reprisal attack,” though he provided no evidence of a connection between the two events (Next, January 25; Vanguard, January 25; Daily Trust, January 25).

The attackers at Farin Lambo first struck a vigilante squad of villagers, killing three before torching homes and barns. The vigilante group was created to repel assailants after the two villages were attacked four times in the previous two weeks (Next, January 25). The military complains that difficult terrain in the region hampers their response to incidents of violence outside the major towns, leaving such villages with little in the way of defense.

After word spread of the killings, women dressed in black attacked the camp of the largely Muslim-officered STF in Vom, shouting anti-STF slogans while throwing stones and setting fire to STF tents. Six women were reported to have been shot by the STF during the demonstration (Nigerian Tribune, January 25; Reuters, January 25).

STF commander Brigadier Umaru said he thought it unlikely that any of his troops would attack people whose safety was in their hands and asked locals to provide him with proof of such allegations (Vanguard, January 25). Some STF members were recently arrested for failing to stop killings in Jos, and the ID card of an STF member was found at the site of some of the killings (Vanguard, January 20).

Even before the latest incidents, Chief Solo Akuma, the senior advocate of Nigeria, called on military authorities to closely monitor the STF for partiality and to reassure locals of the neutrality of the STF when carrying out their duties (Vanguard, January 20).

On January 18, a Nigerian military spokesman warned that soldiers would fire on any community members seen attacking civilians or burning mosques, churches or residences (BBC, January 18).

The sectarian violence in Plateau State began in 1994 and has since claimed thousands of lives. Since 1994 there have been seven commissions of inquiry into the violence, though the results have either been concealed or largely ignored. Though the conflict is often characterized as being a religious-based confrontation between the Muslim Fulani- Hausa and the Christian Berom, Afizere and Anaguta tribes, the dispute has more to do with competition for land and political power between indigenous Christian farmers and so-called “settlers” from the largely nomadic and Muslim communities of northern Nigeria (Next, January 23; Reuters, January 25).

There are also political differences, with the local Christian tribes generally supporting the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), while the nomadic Muslims are viewed as supporters of the opposition All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP).

This article first appeared in the January 28, 2011 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

Former “Afghan Arab” Ali Al-Kurdi Says Jihad against South Yemen’s Separatists Is the First Priority

Posted on January 20, 2011 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

January 20, 2011

A leading Yemeni jihadi and veteran of the post-Soviet struggle for power in Afghanistan has assumed the leadership of a possibly government-backed unity “committee” in the southern Yemeni port of Aden, where the Southern Mobility Movement (SMM) has been organizing a campaign to return the South to its former status as an independent state (Marib Press, January 3). In a recent interview, Ali al-Kurdi described the pro-unity plans of his new organization (al-Sharq al-Awsat, January 4).

According to al-Kurdi, an electrical engineer by trade, the Popular Committee for national unity that he chairs does not receive any state funds (“the committee does not have ten riyals”), but is supported by those who suffered from the economic consequences of socialist rule in southern Yemen’s People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen (PDRY – 1970-1990). Al-Kurdi says socialist rule introduced “freedom of debauchery, alcohol drinking and the like” as well as enabling political persecution on the slightest of pretexts. The former mujahid is ambivalent about his relationship with the regime, on the one hand saying it would be an honor to collaborate with President Ali Abdullah Salih, while on the other recalling his numerous clashes with Yemen’s Political Security Organization (PSO) and a raid on his house that caused his sister to miscarry. He also recalls that it was the entry of Salih’s mixed force of tribesmen, former mujahidin and army regulars into Aden that prevented his execution by the Yemeni Socialist Party (YSP) in 1994.

Al-Kurdi has a long history as a mujahid, armed militant and suspected terrorist. After leaving the PDRY’s army in 1989, al-Kurdi says he left for Sana’a and moved on to Afghanistan after rejecting PDRY claims that he had been exposed to in the army that Afghani Muslims were fighting alongside the Soviets to drive out anti-Islamic mujahideen. Al-Kurdi claims to have carried out attacks in Khost, Jalalabad, Lugar and on the periphery of Kabul during his time in Afghanistan prior to his return to Aden in 1992.

Al-Kurdi was also charged but released as a suspect in the USS Cole bombing of 2000. He later complained of “dirty treatment” and beatings by “jailers and Shiite officials” (Yemen Times, February 26, 2006; Marib Press, January 2). Al-Kurdi was also charged with being a member of al-Qaeda in a 2006 trial of 19 alleged al-Qaeda operatives accused of plotting to assassinate Westerners and blow up a hotel used by American visitors to Yemen. The defendants were freed when the judge ruled Shari’a permitted jihad against the occupiers of Iraq (AP, July 9, 2006). Salih has deployed ex-mujahideen against the Southern separatists before, most notably in the 1994 civil war, when thousands of jihadis were recruited to fight Southerners in exchange for special consideration in post-war Yemen.

The ex-mujahid claims that AQAP has “no connection” to the core al-Qaeda organization, but was rather created by Sunnis who experienced persecution at the hands of (Zaidi) Shiites in PSO prisons. He denied any current relationship with al-Qaeda and downplayed its local significance as a militant group: “Al-Qaeda exists as an organization in all countries of the world, but I rule out [this group] undertaking any operations in Yemen” (Marib Press, January 2).

Though his committee may be poorly funded by his own account, al-Kurdi and his followers are prepared to “repulse” SMM loyalists who might opt for violent resistance to the regime, even through the use of “martyrdom-seeking attacks.” Al-Kurdi asserts that “Jihad for Yemen’s unity takes precedence over jihad in Afghanistan and Palestine. And jihad against the SMM takes precedence over jihad against Jews and Christians.”

Al-Kurdi sees the separatist troubles of southern Yemen as part of a larger effort to divide and rule the Islamic world: “There is a conspiracy to divide Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Iraq. Iraq has already been divided and now it is Sudan’s turn. The [conspirators] will then move on to Saudi Arabia and Yemen… Mecca and Medina’s turn will follow because Yemen constitutes the bulwark of Saudi Arabia. Even the Turks who formerly ruled Yemen viewed Yemen as such.

There are indications that a major campaign of assassination of senior Yemeni military officials has begun inside Yemen, with numerous officers and soldiers being killed in Abyan, Shabwah, Hadramawt and elsewhere (al-Hayat, January 9). Al-Turki blamed the officers and soldiers themselves, though not without assigning some blame to the SMM: “Frankly speaking, these officers and soldiers provide the justification for assassinations and lack of security, because some officers arrest people. When a person goes to prison, he is placed with al-Qaeda affiliated detainees. When such a person gets out of prison, he is angry and seeks revenge on the state. These are revenge acts by some citizens against security personnel. The SMM may be behind some attacks.”

This article first appeared in the January 20, 2011 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

Sudanese Ansar Leader Sadiq al-Mahdi Rejects the Violence of the “al-Qaeda Mentality”

Posted on January 20, 2011 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

January 20, 2011

Sudan’s leading opposition figure, Umma Party leader Sadiq al-Mahdi, has been increasingly vocal in recent weeks as public dissatisfaction grows in North Sudan over the role of the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) and its leader, President Omar al-Bashir, in losing the oil-rich South Sudan in a referendum on secession.

Sadiq al-Mahdi

In a recent interview with a pan-Arab daily, the former Prime Minister and hereditary leader of the Sufi “Ansar” (Helpers) of the western and central Sudan rejected the method of “direct individual violence” adopted by al-Qaeda. Sadiq gives three reasons used to justify extremist violence:

• The presence of foreign occupiers in Muslim lands.
• The presence of foreign usurpers, as in Palestine.
• The existence of social injustice (al-Sharq al-Awsat, January 9).

While Sadiq acknowledges that these problems must be dealt with even by “Islamic Centrists” such as himself, he rejects al-Qaeda’s approach while questioning the perception of al-Qaeda as an hierarchical organization with a central leadership:

“Many people believe that al-Qaeda is an organization; however, my opinion is that al-Qaeda is a mentality, and according to this mentality some people act in a decentralized way. It is not necessary that instructions come from al-Qaeda’s leadership. There is a mentality based on Islamic interpretative judgment, which in its turn is based on the implementation of these rulings, and anyone who does not agree to this is considered an infidel, whether he is a Muslim or non-Muslim; also [shedding] the infidel’s blood is allowed.”

Al-Mahdi has joined several other opposition leaders in giving the NCP government a January 26 deadline for the formation of a national unity government. The day was selected as the anniversary of the triumph of Sadiq’s great grandfather, Muhammad Ahmad al-Mahdi, over Turco-Egyptian forces in Khartoum in 1885. The national unity government is required to negotiate relations with the new South Sudanese state and to resolve the Darfur issue and the arrest warrant of the International Criminal Court (ICC) for Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir on related war crimes charges: “The ICC issue has to be dealt with on a rational basis and not superficially by thinking that it can be ignored, and that it will be resolved and pass on its own.” The Sudanese President was succinct in his response: “Whoever wants to overthrow the government can lick his elbow….. There will not be a national government” (Sudan Tribune, December 28, 2010).

Sadiq also criticized the United States for its support of Southern independence while ignoring the development of democracy in the North:

I believe that there is a fundamental dysfunction in the United States. The foreign policy is drawn up by “lobbies,” and what these “lobbies” believe influences the policy of the U.S. Administration. “The lobbies” in existence today are interested in conducting the referendum and the birth of the South State without enough interest in what happens in the North State. This is despite the fact that any rational thinking considers it to be extremely necessary for the North State itself to be rational so that it does not contain any tendency to sabotage the South State.

The former prime minister went on to suggest that after the “failure of its policies” in Iraq and Afghanistan, the United States wants to present the secession of the South as “an achievement of its foreign policy.” He fears that U.S. support for secession has taken little account of the need for the new state to exist in peace with North Sudan. “The United States ought to understand that the referendum cannot be allowed to be a cause for new wars,” Sadiq stated.

Looking at the ruling National Congress Party (NCP) of Omar al-Bashir, Sadiq suggests that the party no longer speaks with one voice, with leading members advocating everything from wanting to get rid of the South to more effectively Islamize the rest of the nation, to those who declare the Muslim signatories of any peace treaty with the South to be infidels. “The NCP is close to becoming a ‘vehicle of convenience’ and not an institution; each passenger speaks in his own language.”

However, Sadiq says that he does not regard al-Bashir as an extremist, but notes that “he can become enthusiastic. It is extremely possible that there are groups that have exerted pressure in this direction [i.e. religious extremism], and he responded to them.”

Mubarak al-Fadl, Sadiq’s cousin and leader of the Umma Reform and Renewal Party (URRP), was even more direct in his criticism of the NCP, saying it now feared a popular uprising in the North after using most of its oil wealth for “security and political functions”; “The National Congress Party is just using religion to support the police state and step up the oppression of the population… Al-Bashir is a military man who swore an oath to preserve the territorial integrity of Sudan and now he has to let the South go away. He cannot swallow that” (Sudan Tribune, December 21, 2010). Al-Fadl’s opposition to the NCP began in 2004 after he was removed from his post as a presidential adviser. Though he has often clashed with his cousin Sadiq (much of Khartoum’s political elite is related through blood or marriage), al-Fadl announced the dissolution of the URRP on the last day of 2010, saying he would now integrate his party with that of Sadiq Umma.

This article first appeared in the January 20, 2011 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

New Law Sets Notorious Turkish Hezbollah Members Free

Posted on January 13, 2011 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

January 13, 2011

Turkish Hezbollah Military Leader Haci Inan (Haberler)

At least 25 suspected terrorists in a notorious mass torture-murder investigation have been released by a Turkish court under the new terms of article 102 of the Criminal Procedure Code, which forbids detention for more than ten years without the conclusion of a trial. The release of the suspects from Turkish Hezbollah has pitted politicians and judges in a dispute over responsibility while an outraged public questions the state’s dedication to eliminating terrorist groups in Turkey. The men are among as many as 1,000 suspected criminals expected to be released under the new law (NTV, January 5; Hurriyet, January 6; Today’s Zaman, January 5). Many more terrorist suspects, including the killer of journalist Hrant Dink, could be released within the coming year. Other beneficiaries of the changes include members of the Kurdistan Workers Party (Partiya Karkeren Kurdistan – PKK) and various left-wing organizations. Some of the suspects did not reach the streets after their release from custody, however; having failed to complete mandatory military service, they were taken straight to military recruiting offices.

Edip Gumus

The freed members of the ethnic Kurdish and Sunni Hezbollah movement (no connection to Lebanon’s Shi’a Hezbollah) include military leader Haci Inan, Istanbul leader Ilyas Kutulman and assassin Edip Gumus, who is accused of killing 42 people. The suspects were arrested in a January 2000 investigation that resulted in the death of Hezbollah leader Huseyin Velioglu and the discovery of dozens of bodies (many showing signs of torture and restraint) beneath a number of Hezbollah safe-houses. Many of the dead showed signs of having been buried alive. Searches discovered hundreds of videotapes recording the torture and execution of Kurdish PKK members and rival Islamists, many of them moderates (see Terrorism Monitor, January 25, 2008). Inan and Kutulman were charged with “attempting to overturn the constitutional order via force of arms,” based on Hezbollah’s avowed intention to replace the existing state with an Islamic government by force (Anatolia, January 4). The case is complicated by numerous allegations that Hezbollah operated as a covert arm of the state’s efforts to crush Kurdish separatism and Islamist challenges to the officially secular Turkish state (Hurriyet, January 7; BBC, January 23, 2000).

Many of the Hezbollah suspects were quickly given life sentences in local courts after their arrest, but once the cases arrived at the Supreme Court of Appeals in Ankara they became bogged down in the sluggish and undermanned Turkish justice system (Hurriyet, January 7). Others received life sentences in December 2009.

Though the suspects are not allowed to travel and must report to police on a regular basis, there is no indication that the appeals court will arrive at a verdict any time soon. The ordinance has come under legal criticism in Turkey as still failing to meet EU standards as intended.

This article first appeared in the January 13, 2011 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.

Arabs and Tuareg Clash over Narcotics Smuggling in Northern Mali

Posted on January 13, 2011 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

January 13, 2011

Emerging reports describe a major gun-battle between Bérabiche Arabs escorting a convoy of Moroccan cannabis through the Malian Sahel and a party of armed Tuareg nobles who appeared, in traditional fashion, to demand a fee for passing through their territory (El Watan [Algiers], January 4). The convoy of roughly 20 four-wheel drive vehicles was on its way through northeastern Mali, bound for Libya via Niger. An intense battle lasting several hours followed the convoy’s attempt to bypass the Tuareg gunmen, resulting in the death of five traffickers and two Tuareg, along with an unknown number of wounded.

Armed Tuareg

Some factions of Mali’s Tuareg have been petitioning the government for permission to form government-sponsored anti-terrorist militias (See Terrorism Monitor Briefs, November 4, 2010). Implementation of this plan appears to have been postponed to avoid an “unpredictable reaction” from the al-Qaeda kidnappers of seven foreign hostages (including five Frenchmen) seized at the Areva uranium plant in northern Niger. The hostages are currently being held at AQIM strongholds in northwest Mali.

It has been suggested that al-Qaeda is involved in the flourishing narcotics smuggling in the Sahara/Sahel region, but other sources indicate that while there is an overlap in the use of smugglers and drivers that work in the narcotics trade, al-Qaeda makes ample money from its kidnappings and wishes to avoid the additional security complications that would follow a full-scale commitment to international narcotics trafficking (El Watan, January 3).

Drug cartels from Venezuela, Spain, Portugal and Colombia are reported to be active in the Malian capital of Bamako, where their violent competition often appears to elude the attention of local police (El Watan, January 3). Malian police recently entered a Bamako cement warehouse to find a Venezuelan and a Portuguese trafficker using a chainsaw to cut up the body of a Colombian using a fake Ukrainian passport. The discovery was not part of an investigation and the Portuguese suspect has already escaped (Le Monde, January 3).

Malian authorities reported breaking up a trafficking network during a raid near the Mauritanian border on December 9, 2010. The network was allegedly composed of ex-fighters of the West Saharan Polisario Front, now confined to camps in southern Algeria (AFP, December 10, 2010). Tamensa, located near the meeting point of the Algerian, Nigerien and Malian borders, appears to be a hotspot of trafficking and smuggling activity (al-Hayat, January 1). In the cities of northern Mali, specifically Gao, Kidal and Timbuktu, a mini-building boom has followed the influx of kidnapping and trafficking revenues and banks are reported to accept bags of cash without question (Le Monde, December 22, 2010).

There are indications, however, that a Tuareg vs. Arab paradigm may not reflect the reality of the violence in northern Mali. The introduction of democracy by the state has created something of a social revolution in the region. Since the April 2009 regional elections, the traditional leaders of the Arab community, the Arab-Berber Kounta, and the traditional leaders of the Tuareg, the Ifogha, have lost a great deal of their previous influence. The “noble” groups blame this on the alleged use of smuggling money by their respective vassal communities (the Telemsi and Bérabiche Arabs and the Imghad Tuareg) to buy victory in the elections, creating an inversion of the existing power structure in northern Mali. The growing dispute has erupted in ambushes of Arab-Imghad narcotics convoys crossing the region (U.S. Embassy Bamako cable, February 1, 2010, as published in the Guardian, December 14, 2010; Le Monde, December 22, 2010; MaliKounda.com, December 7, 2009; see also Terrorism Monitor, November 4, 2010).

This article first appeared in the January 13, 2011 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.

Unclaimed New Year’s Day Bombing in Abuja Rattles Nigeria’s Power Structure

Posted on January 6, 2011 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

January 6, 2011

A New Year’s Eve bombing within the confines of a Nigerian military base in the capital city of Abuja has damaged Nigeria’s political stability, as various politicians and civil leaders seek to implicate each other as responsible for the unclaimed blast. The bombing, which killed four civilians (including a pregnant woman) and wounded 26, was the second terrorist attack in the nation’s capital since October.

The “Mammy Market” at the Mogadishu Cantonment, Abuja
(Sahara Reporters)

The attack targeted an open-air bar and restaurant at a so-called “Mammy Market,” a civilian-run market attached to Abuja’s “Mogadishu Cantonment” military base providing shopping and recreational opportunities. The explosion culminated a week of violence in Nigeria that began with a series of bombings on Christmas Eve in the Plateau State city of Jos, a common site for sectarian violence in recent years between the Muslim and Christian communities. Eighty people were killed in the Jos bombings and subsequent retaliatory attacks. This was followed by a bombing at a rally of the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in Yenogoa in Bayelsa State and murders and church burnings in Maiduguri in Borno State (Next [Lagos], January 4; Vanguard [Lagos], January 3; Daily Trust [Lagos], December 30, 2010).

On January 3 the government of President Goodluck Jonathan responded to the violence by holding an emergency closed-door meeting of the nation’s top security officials. Following the meeting, spokesmen announced a number of measures to be taken, including:

The appointment of a special presidential advisor on terrorism.
The installation of new closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras in sensitive areas of Abuja, though existing CCTV installations proved of little use in the latest attack.
New regulations regarding access to public and private establishments.
The creation of a presidential committee on the control of explosives and incendiary materials
The creation of a presidential committee on public enlightenment regarding security measures.

A presidential spokesman indicated that police had been “directed to ensure the prompt arrest and prosecution of political thugs” (Next [Abuja], January 4). Jonathan’s government has invited American FBI agents and members of Israel’s MOSSAD intelligence organization to help investigate the Abuja bombing (Vanguard, January 3; Abuja Leadership, January 3).

The Movement for the Emancipation of Niger Delta (MEND), which claimed responsibility for a pair of car bombings in the capital last October, issued a statement through spokesman Jomo Gbomo denying any involvement in the attack at the Mogadishu Cantonment: “Bombings and attacks carried out by MEND are always preceded by a warning in order to prevent casualties and followed by a statement of claim… [MEND] condemns the deliberate targeting of civilians by any persons or groups for what so ever reasons” (AFP, January 2; Vanguard, January 2).

PDP primaries next week will be followed by what is expected to be hotly contested presidential, gubernatorial and parliamentary elections in April. With the political direction of the country in the balance, few seem able to resist the temptation to link political opponents to the ongoing violence.

The campaign organization of Jonathan’s main challenger for the PDP presidential nomination for upcoming elections in April, former vice-president Atiku Abubakar, denounced what it described as efforts by the president’s paid agents to link Abubakar with the Abuja bombing: “In a moment of national crisis, President Goodluck Jonathan must demonstrate sobriety and cool-headed posture rather than losing his head to impetuous emotions… The President should allow security services to carry out intensive investigations instead of using the incident to frame up political opponents whom he perceives as stumbling blocks to his ambition” (Next, January 4).

Former military ruler of Nigeria General Ibrahim Babangida (1985-1993) has also complained of government attempts to tie him to the Abuja bombing, describing it as “sheer blackmail”: “It exposes the weakness in the system if private persons and former leaders who are enjoying their retirement are being linked to acts of terrorism or bombings. We all should agree that there is failure in governance rather than passing the buck, or finding very idiotic and flimsy reasons to label some distinguished persons as being responsible for such failures” (Vanguard, January 3; Daily Sun [Lagos], January 3). Various NGOs, as well as religious and labor leaders have alleged that the Abuja bombing is part of an attempt to create a state of emergency leading to the military’s return to power (Nigerian Compass [Lagos], January 4; Daily Trust, January 3).

The Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Muhammadu Abubakar, made an unfavorable comparison between the current state of security and that which existed under military rule. “We should blame the political class for getting us to this stage because it was not like this before,” Abubakar claimed (Daily Trust, December 30, 2010).

Nigeria’s intelligence services have come under strong public criticism for repeated failures to anticipate eruptions of sectarian violence in northern and central Nigeria. Army Chief-of-Staff Lieutenant General Azubuike Ihejirike acknowledged the failure, saying there is a need to “enhance intelligence operations” (Daily Trust, December 30, 2010). Meanwhile, Defense Minister Prince Adetokunbo Kayode promised the investigation would continue, saying, “The perpetrators are here, they are not from the moon and we will get them” (Vanguard, January 2).

This article first appeared in the January 6, 2011 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

Mysterious Murder of Lebanese Islamist Militant Ghandi al-Sahmarani

Posted on January 6, 2011 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

January 6, 2011

The late-December murder of Lebanese Islamist and Jund al-Sham commander Ghandi Sahmarani (a.k.a. Abu Ramiz) was an instructive example of the changing balance of power in Lebanon’s Ayn al-Hilweh refugee camp, which exploded in Islamist-inspired violence in 2007.

Former Jund al-Sham Commander Ghandi Sahmarani

While political assassinations are far from unknown in the Palestinian camps, Sahmarani’s death followed a different pattern from the usual shootings and bombings. Though exact details remain unclear, it appears that Sahmarani was brutally tortured for as long as 48 hours before his ultimate death by hanging or a gunshot to the mouth (Now Lebanon, January 3). There was no claim of responsibility for the killing. Sahmarani, a native of Tripoli, was closely tied to the Ayn al-Hilweh camp for over 20 years. Following the discovery of his body the Lebanese Army moved additional forces to the entrance of the camp, but the anticipated unrest never materialized (Naharnet, December 27, 2010; December 28, 2010).

Established in 2004, Jund al-Sham (“The Army of Greater Syria”) is a splinter group of the larger Usbat al-Ansar (“League of Partisans”), an armed Salafist movement formed in the 1980s. Unlike a number of other Salafist groups operating in the Palestinian refugee camps, both Usbat al-Ansar and Jund al-Sham include native Lebanese members, like Sahmarani, as well as Palestinians in their ranks (Naharnet, May 31, 2008). The small group of roughly 50 Jund al-Sham militants joined the Fatah al-Islam movement in the bitter fighting against the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) that erupted in the Nahr al-Bared refugee camp in 2007 and later spread to Ayn al-Hilweh.

Sources within the camp say the brutal killing was not politically motivated, but rather came in response to allegations that Sahmarani had raped a number of married and unmarried women within the site (Now Lebanon, January 3). One Islamist leader who declined to be named told a Beirut daily that Sahmarani was killed “for moral reasons” after raping a married woman and videotaping her naked (Daily Star [Beirut], December 29, 2010). Lebanese radio reported that the killers had been identified and were part of Sahmarani’s “inner circle” (Voice of Lebanon Radio, December 27, 2010).

Jund al-Sham has had frequent clashes with the secular Palestinian Fatah movement led by Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas (a.k.a. Abu Mazin) (al-Hayat, March 24, 2008). Fatah security official Mahmud Abd al-Hamid Isa “al-Lino” in particular has been in the forefront of efforts to rein in Jund al-Sham extremists, who have frequently endangered relations between the Palestinians and Lebanese authorities. Al-Lino is a senior commander in Fatah’s Palestinian Armed Struggle (PAS), which serves as a civil police force in the Palestinian camps. The camps are administered by Palestinian authorities rather than the Lebanese government under the terms of a treaty. Recently the Islamist factions have been cooperating with the PAS to restore order and security to the Palestinian camps, leaving little room for extremists like Sahmarani. Even other armed Islamist groups such as Usbat al-Ansar have participated in campaigns to disarm and dismantle the Jund al-Sham organization. Under pressure from all sides, many Jund al-Sham militants have fled to Europe, joined the jihad in Iraq, or returned to the ranks of Usbat al-Ansar.

Fatah’s al-Lino issued a prompt denial of Fatah involvement in the killing of Sahmarani, describing it as “an incident shrouded in mystery” (Daily Star [Beirut], December 29, 2010). Though an Ayn al-Hilweh shop owned by a PAS major was bombed shortly after the discovery of Sahmarani’s body, authorities were reluctant to make any connection between the two events. Authorities are likely correct in this; considering the circumstances and method of Sahmarani’s murder, his near complete isolation, the general desire, even among Islamists, for security and the unsupportable nature of the allegations against Sahmarani, retaliation for his death would definitely be inadvisable for his few remaining supporters. His followers (if any indeed still exist) might be more likely to seek the services of human smugglers to emigrate to Europe, a path frequently taken by other Ayn al-Hilweh militants who have found themselves under pressure in the close confines of the camp. The new but largely powerless Jund al-Sham leadership will be under close scrutiny from Palestinian security forces, Lebanese intelligence and even their fellow Islamists in Ayn al-Hilweh.

This article first appeared in the January 6, 2011 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

The Triangle of Death: Central Africa’s New Hub of Regional Instability

Posted on December 16, 2010 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

December 16, 2010

As peacekeepers pull out of a notorious and remote corner of Africa known as the “Triangle of Death,” bands of gunmen are pouring in to fill the void in security. At the core of this problem is a former French colony that became a nation-state despite a lack of viability and is now rapidly collapsing, offering guerrillas, terrorists and outlaws a relatively risk-free haven to conduct their operations.

(BBC)

Background

A land-locked nation of 4.4 million people, the Central African Republic is one of the poorest countries on earth. As Oubangui-Chari, it was part of the French African Empire from the late 19th century to 1960, when it gained independence as the Central African Republic (CAR). The region’s pre-independence leader, Barthelmy Boganda, did not believe the CAR could become a viable independent state and instead sought to make it part of an envisioned “United States of Latin Africa,” uniting the former Central African colonies of Belgium, France, Portugal and Spain. Boganda and his dream of a united Central Africa died shortly before independence when his plane exploded in 1959. Agriculture dominates the local economy, though there are a number of unexploited resource reserves. Forestry and diamond mining account for most of the CAR’s slim export revenue. France protects its interests and citizens in Bangui with an infantry company of 200 legionnaires belonging to the 2e Régiment Étranger d’Infanterie.

The CAR is best known in the West for the antics and atrocities of its former ruler, “Emperor” Jean-Bédel Bokassa, a former captain in the French Colonial Army who squandered the nation’s meager wealth in ruling the re-named “Central African Empire” in an imperial style from 1966 to 1979. In recent years the political violence in the CAR has become closely tied to violence in neighboring Chad and Darfur.

Battle for Birao

On November 24, rebels belonging to the Convention des Patriotes pour la Justice et la Paix (Convention of Patriots for Peace and Justice – CPJP), supported by fighters formerly belonging to Chadian rebel movements, took the strategically important town of Birao and captured its military commander after a short battle with troops of the Forces Armées Centrafricaines (Central African Armed Forces – FACA) (AFP, November 24). The rebels had previously attacked Birao in July. The CPJP began operations in 2009 and since then has seized a number of towns and villages in the CAR’s northeast (BBC, November 27, 2009). Rebels claimed the defeated FACA troops belonged to the Presidential Guard, the only CAR military unit of any real worth (AFP, November 25).

Heavy rains prevented CAR forces from returning to the town after it was seized, though most of the country’s best troops were busy in the capital of Bangui preparing for the December 1 military parade commemorating the 50th anniversary of the independence of the CAR. On taking Birao, CPJP head of operations Abdoulaye Issene declared, “We have seized 48 prisoners and recovered a big stock of weapons. Birao is taken, but our target is Bangui” (Reuters, November 24).

Units of Chad’s military based in Abéché crossed the border with the CAR in late November on their way to Birao. A CPJP statement described a Chadian force including tanks and helicopters that began to bomb Birao, forcing the evacuation of the rebels on November 30. Chad’s army chief-of-staff, General Alain Mbaidodenande Djionadji, told reporters, “We affirm that the Chadian Army has exercised its right of pursuit by destroying the remaining mercenaries who have involved themselves with unidentified adventurers who were holed up in Birao” (AFP, November 30; Reuters, December 1). The town’s population of 8,000 was forced to spend a week in the bush without water, food or shelter. Food stocks kept in the town were looted during the fighting, leaving nothing for returnees (IRIN, December 7).

In a belated attempt to assert sovereignty in the area, CAR government spokesmen were quick to claim the retaking of Birao as a victory for the FACA, saying 65 rebels had been killed in the battle. According to CAR spokesman Fidele Ngouandjika, CAR troops had retaken the town without the help of foreign forces, “contrary to the mendacious allegations” broadcast by foreign media sources (AFP, December 2). This declaration ran contrary to statements from both the Chadian military and the CPJP.

The former leader of the CPJP was Charles Massi, the minister of mines and agriculture in the government of President Ange-Félix Patassé, who was supported by Libyan troops and 300 Congolese rebels under Jean-Pierre Bemba, who is currently on trial for war crimes in The Hague. Massi took to the bush after Patassé’s government was overthrown in 2003 by General François Bozizé, the current ruler of the CAR. After being arrested by Chadian authorities, Massi is believed to have died in January 2010 after extensive torture at the Central African prison of Bossembélé. President Bozizé has close ties with the Chadian regime of Idriss Déby and came to power with Chadian military assistance. Chad supplies many members of the Presidential Guard, the best-equipped element of the CAR armed forces.

The Peacekeepers Depart

A UN peacekeeping mission, the Mission des Nations Unies en République Centrafricaine et au Tchad (MINURCAT), has provided security along the borders of Chad, Darfur and the CAR since 2007. The severely underfunded and undermanned mission has roughly 1,500 uniformed military and police personnel drawn from 35 nations under the military command of Senegal’s Major-General Elhadji Mouhamedou Kandji. The military component of the force was authorized to succeed operations of the European Union’s EUFOR Tchad/RCA, a peacekeeping force of 3,700 troops under the command of Ireland’s Lieutenant General Patrick Nash. The majority of the force came from France, with Ireland and Poland also making major contributions. EUFOR Tchad/RCA ended operations in March 2009. Birao was the site of a small EUFOR Tchad/RCA base during the EU deployment.

The decision to withdraw MINURCAT came in May after Chad said it would assume responsibility for security in its territory after criticizing MINURCAT’s slow deployment and apparent inability to provide security for civilians. Though the peacekeepers had little effect in the northeastern CAR due to small numbers and a limited mandate that prevented them from tackling local bandits, their full withdrawal (scheduled for December 31, though operations ended on October 15) will leave security in the region solely in the hands of the CAR armed forces, which has very little presence in the area. Most of the army, including its best-equipped troops, is kept in the capital of Bangui as protection for the regime against coups, insurrections or civil unrest. President Bozizé is also believed to oppose the presence of international peacekeepers in the CAR, preferring instead to seek financial support for the expansion of the CAR’s armed forces. At the moment, the president cannot count on the complete loyalty of his poorly-equipped army. There are reports of disobedience and refusals by some troops to deploy to dangerous areas of the country, leading to purges of disloyal soldiers (Centrafrique Presse, March 24, March 29; Radio Ndeke Luka [Bangui], March 26).

In the absence of MINURCAT, a military protocol was signed between Bangui and Khartoum to create a joint border patrol to monitor the movements of Chadian and Sudanese rebels in the region. The Sudanese component includes former Darfur rebels of the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) under the command of Minni Minawi, who joined the government in 2006 (SUNA, September 26; Sudan Tribune, September 27).

The “Triangle of Death”

Between 1850 and 1910 most of what is today the northeastern part of the CAR was largely depopulated by immense slave raids carried out by the Sultans of Dar Kuti, Dar Wadai and Dar Baguirmi. Though it was no longer called slavery, French colonial forces continued the tradition of forced labor in the 20th century. Birao remains highly isolated from the rest of the CAR (which has less than 500 km of paved roads) and has even been used as a place of internal exile. The town changed hands several times in 2006-2007 in fighting between the rebel Union des Forces Démocratiques pour le Rassemblement (Union of Democratic Forces for Unity – UFDR) and CAR troops backed by French forces stationed in Bangui. After the negotiation of a peace agreement with the UFDR, Birao was occupied by EUFOR Tchad/RCA troops, succeeded by a MINURCAT detachment, which turned the town over to the FACA on November 15.

Forces Armées Centrafricaines Soldier in Birao – note row of amulets worn on his lanyard.

Today, nearly three million displaced people live in the triangle formed by the borders of Sudan, Chad and the CAR. Without government control, civilians of the region have suffered widespread abuses at the hands of roving gangs of gunmen with or without political pretensions who replenish their ranks, labor force and harems by abducting children. Development of the CAR’s northeast has been ignored by successive CAR governments, most of which have concerned themselves solely with enriching members of the regime and their tribal supporters. The government has attempted to farm out security by raising and backing local vigilante groups, but even these have posed a threat to local security. An estimated 30,000 refugees from Sudan and the DRC are present in the CAR, many dwelling in the bush far from humanitarian relief.

The collapse of the Chadian insurgency after its Sudanese sponsors negotiated a peace agreement with N’Djamena left a large number of well-armed fighters looking for new bases in the CAR rather than returning to Chad to take advantage of an amnesty. After most of the leaders of the Darfur-based Chadian insurgent groups were expelled by Khartoum to Doha, these groups quickly deteriorated into undisciplined and leaderless gangs. Among those believed to be heading to the CAR are fighters from the Union des Forces de Résistance (UFR) under the command of Adam Yacoub (Sudan Tribune, September 27).

The Lord’s Resistance Army

An ongoing and seemingly irresolvable security threat in the region is posed by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), a decades-old insurgent group that has gradually morphed into a loosely organized terror-spreading group that has no other ideology other than ensuring its continued existence through rape, murder, kidnapping, looting and torture. The Acholi-based LRA has its roots in the 1986 overthrow of Uganda’s Acholi ruler, General Tito Okello, by Yoweri Museveni’s National Resistance Army (NRA), but has long ceased any pretense of representing the Acholi community.

Since the failure of the U.S. supported Ugandan military operation “Lightning Thunder” in December 2008 (which split the LRA into a number of different groups rather than eliminate it), the movement has continued its depredations in southwest Sudan, the CAR and the northeastern DRC. In the last two years the LRA has killed over 2,000 people in the CAR’s northeast and abducted thousands more. Though LRA leader Joseph Kony no longer has effective control of his scattered fighters, his divided movement continues to carry out atrocities and abductions under various sub-commanders. Units of the LRA attacked Birao in October, looting shops and abducting women (AFP, November 24).

CAR Defense Minister Jean-François Bozizé, nephew of President François Bozizé, has denounced LRA atrocities in the nation, including “incursions, pillage, massacres, rapes, hostage takings and villages that are systematically burned down,” while insisting that “the LRA is now a terrorist organization like al-Qaeda” (AFP, October 14).

The CAR has also joined in forming a joint military brigade with forces from Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the Sudan, intended to complete the elimination of the LRA (Daily Monitor [Kampala], October 19). However, with South Sudanese independence looking like the sure result of next month’s independence referendum, Khartoum may choose to continue using the LRA as a regional proxy to threaten the security of those nations choosing to support the separation of South Sudan.

A new U.S. strategy designed to eliminate the threats posed by the LRA to civilians and regional stability has four stated objectives:

• Increase protection of civilians.

• Apprehend or remove Joseph Kony and his sub-commanders.

• Promote the defection, disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of the remaining LRA fighters.

• Increase humanitarian access and provide relief to affected communities. [1]

Conclusion

Lying outside of any effective government control, Birao and the rest of the CAR’s northeast region offer insurgent groups, bandits, deserters and renegades an appealing mix of isolation from the CAR state infrastructure and proximity to the borders with Chad and Sudan.

Presidential elections, which have been postponed four times this year, are now set to take place on January 23, 2011, only weeks after neighboring South Sudan’s independence referendum, an event with profound implications for regional security. With the two leading candidates being Bozizé and his ousted predecessor Patassé, there appears to be little chance for substantial change in the CAR. A third possible candidate, former prime minister Martin Ziguele, has been accused by government spokesmen of being a terrorist and the “new de facto president of the CPJP,” though no evidence was produced to support this charge (AFP, September 24).

Note

1. “Letter from the President on the Strategy to Support the Disarmament of the Lord’s Resistance Army,” November 24, 2010, www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2010/11/24/letter-president-strategy-support-disarmament-lords-resistance-army.

This article first appeared in the December 16, 2010 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor

Russian Operations in Tatarstan Eliminate Militant Islamist Cell

Posted on December 16, 2010 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

December 16, 2010

Russian security forces conducted a special operation in the Tatarstan village of Novoye Almetyevo against a group of three Islamist militants. The gunmen attracted the attention of security forces after firing on a wildlife enforcement officer who thought they were poachers and shooting at the car of a private security firm in the Nurlatsky district (Itar-Tass, November 25).

The security forces arrived in strength, deploying armored vehicles, an Mi-8 helicopter, and 500 members of the FSB (Federal’naya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti – Federal Security Service) and the Interior Ministry’s OMON (Otryad Militsii Osobogo Naznacheniya – Special Purpose Police Units) (Islamic News, December 2). The three insurgents were killed after a gunfight lasting two hours.

The militant cell included 26-year-old Almaz Davletshin, described as a “radical cleric” who had previously served four years in prison for the theft of scrap metal, Ruslan Spirodonov, wanted for an unsuccessful November 11 bombing of a police car in Chistopol, and Albert Khusnutdinov. The men were each armed with an assault rifle and a grenade launcher.

A day after the gun-battle, security forces discovered a dugout in the nearby village of Butaikha. The dugout was believed to belong to the three insurgents and contained clothing, a pistol silencer, mobile communications gear, bomb-making equipment and a USB stick which contained bomb-making instructions and “rules of conduct for a young mujahid” (Interfax, November 30).

Tatarstan is a highly industrialized autonomous republic that produces much of Russia’s arms, chemicals and automobiles. Though official Islam in the republic has been known for its opposition to Salafism, the former Mufti of Tatarstan and current leader of the Center for Research on the Koran and the Sunna, Farid-Hazrat Salman, claims that radical Wahhabists have infiltrated the traditionally moderate Spiritual Board of Muslims of Tatarstan (DUM), becoming the dominant trend in that institution with the financial support of Saudi Arabia (Nezavisimaya Gazeta [Moscow], December 6). Nevertheless, current Mufti Gusman Iskhakov (accused by Salman of being a Wahhabist) warned Tatarstan Muslims in the aftermath of the raid not to “succumb to provocations,” warning that “certain political forces in our country do not want our peace and tranquility, and seek all ways to sow discord and confusion among us” (Islamic News, December 2).

Founder of Jadidism Ismail Gaspirali

The Tatars of the Volga-Ural region of Russia converted to Islam in the 10th century and today form the largest minority group in Russia. The arrival of radical conservative Salafism in recent years poses a major challenge to Tatar Islam, which is based on both traditional Sufism and the indigenous modernizing trend of Jadidism (a reformist and pan-Turkic attempt to reconcile Eastern Islam with Western thought and science) since the 19th century. Like most parts of Islamic Russia, Tatarstan was significantly secularized during Soviet rule, but is now enjoying an Islamic revival, though this has involved several competing trends. The entry of Salafism to the region in the 1990s has been aided by the relatively poor knowledge of Islamic theology held by many Tatar imams.

A recent conference of Islamic scholars in the Tatarstan capital of Kazan warned that growing extremism in the republic could lead to the development of an “Ingush-Dagestani scenario,” referring to the growth of religiously inspired armed militant groups carrying out attacks in previously stable regions of the Russian Federation.

This article first appeared in the December 16, 2010 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.

Algerian Counter-Terrorism Offensive Hunts AQIM Leadership in the Kabylia Mountains

Posted on December 16, 2010 by McGregor

Andrew McGregor

December 16, 2010

While the Sahel/Sahara Command of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) has dominated reports of the movement’s activities over the last year, Algeria’s military continues to combat AQIM’s northern command, based in the largely Berber Kabylia Mountains.

A major Algerian military offensive involving some 4,000 to 5,000 troops was launched on December 9 with the participation of Special Forces units and aerial support from helicopter gunships. Operations have focused on the North-Central wilaya-s (provinces) of Tizi Ouzou, Boumerdès and Bouira, mountainous strongholds of the Islamist insurgency since the 1990s. Operations in the latter regions were designed to prevent reinforcements from coming to the relief of the militants in Tizi Ouzou. The offensive was launched on the basis of information obtained through the interrogation of captured AQIM militants regarding a major meeting of AQIM amirs at Sidi Ali Bounab (70 miles east of Algiers), to be presided over by AQIM leader Abdelmalek Droukdel (a.k.a. Abu Mus’ab Abd al-Wadoud) (El-Khabar [Algiers], December 12; Tout sur l’Algérie [Algiers], December 13).

According to sources in the Algerian security establishment, the meeting was intended to organize a group to be sent south to fend off a planned coup by the Sahel/Sahara command of AQIM designed to depose Droukdel as overall commander and establish an independent emirate in the Sahel/Sahara (El-Khabar, December 12).

Kabylia

The army jammed mobile telephone networks in the operational region to prevent AQIM cells from communicating or detonating prepared explosives with cell phones. Only days before the offensive, Algerian defense official Abdelmalik Guenaizia asked visiting AFRICOM commander General David Hogg for the latest jamming equipment to prevent remote cell phone detonation of improvised explosive devices (CNN, December 7; Ennahar [Algiers], December 6).

By December 12, as many as 20 AQIM terrorists were reported to have been killed. Algerian authorities have obtained DNA samples from relatives of AQIM commander Abdelmalek Droudkel and Amir Abou Derar in an effort to confirm their deaths in the operation (Tout sur l’Algérie, December 13). The offensive was also reported to have disrupted a major plot to use cell phone-detonated explosives in a bombing campaign in Tizi Ouzou, Boumerdès and Bouira (El-Khabar, December 12). The deaths of Droukdel and Derar remain unconfirmed at the time of publication while a reported 2,000 additional troops were reported to be joining the offensive as some militants remain under siege by Algerian forces (al-Fadjr [Algiers], December 12).

This article first appeared in the December 16, 2010 issue of the Jamestown Foundation’s Terrorism Monitor.