Algerian gas plant attack mastermind Mokhtar Belmokhtar 'killed in Mali'

 
3 March 2013

The Al-Qaeda commander who masterminded the Algeria gas plant hostage crisis that claimed the lives of six British nationals has been killed by African soldiers, it has been reported.

Chad's military chief said his troops deployed in northern Mali had killed Mokhtar Belmokhtar.

The French military, which is leading the offensive against al Qaida-linked rebels in Mali, said they could not immediately confirm the information.

Authorities in Kidal, the northern town being used as the base for the military operation, cast doubt on the assertion, saying Chadian officials were attempting to score a PR victory to make up for the significant losses they had suffered in recent days.

Known as the "one-eyed", Belmokhtar's profile soared after the mid-January attack and mass hostage-taking on a huge Algerian gas plant.

His purported death comes a day after Chad's president said his troops had killed Abou Zeid, the other main al Qaida commander operating in northern Mali.

If both deaths are confirmed, it would mean that the international intervention in Mali had succeeded in decapitating two of the pillars of al-Qaida in the Sahara.

"Chad's armed forces in Mali have completely destroyed a base used by jihadists and narcotraffickers in the Adrar and Ifoghas mountains" of northern Mali, army chief of staff General Zakaria Ngobongue said in a televised statement on state-owned National Chadian Television.

"The provisional toll is as follows: Several terrorists killed, including Moktar Belmokhtar."

The French military moved into Mali on January 11 to push back militants linked to Belmokhtar and Abou Zeid and other extremist groups which had imposed harsh Islamic rule in the north of the vast country and who were seen as an international terrorist threat.

France is trying to rally other African troops to help in the military campaign, since Mali's military is weak and poor. Chadian troops have offered the most robust reinforcement.

In Paris, French military spokesman Col Thierry Burkhard said that he had "no information" on the possibility that Belmokhtar was dead. The Foreign Ministry refused to confirm or deny the report.

A spokesman for Chad's presidential palace did not immediately return a request for comment.

In Kidal, an elected official said that he did not believe Belmokhtar was dead and waved off the claim as an attempt by Chad to explain the loss of dozens of their troops to a grieving nation.

"These last few weeks, the Chadians have lost a significant number of soldiers in combat. (Claiming that they killed Belmokhtar) is a way to give some importance to their intervention in Mali," said the official, who is in close contact with both French and Malian commanders in the field.

Belmokhtar, an Algerian, is believed to be in his 40s, and like his sometimes partner and sometimes rival Abou Zeid, he began on the path to terrorism after Algeria's secular government voided the 1991 election won by an Islamic party.

Both men joined the Armed Islamic Group, or GIA, and later its offshoot, the GSPC, a group that carried out suicide bombings on Algerian government targets.

Around 2003, both men crossed into Mali, where they began a lucrative kidnapping business, snatching European tourists, aid workers, government employees and even diplomats and holding them for multi-million ransoms.

The Algerian terror cell amassed a significant war chest, and joined the al Qaida fold in 2006, renaming itself al Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb.

Belmokhtar claims he trained in Afghanistan in the 1990s, including in one of Osama Bin Laden's camps. It was there that he reportedly lost an eye, earning him the nickname "Laaouar", Arabic for "one-eyed".

Until last December, Belmokhtar and Abou Zeid headed separate brigades under the flag of al Qaida's chapter in the Sahara. But after months of reports of infighting between the two,

Belmokhtar peeled off, announcing the creation of his own terror unit, still loyal to the al Qaida ideology but separate from al Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb.

It was this group that launched the fatal attack on a BP-operated natural gas plant in south-eastern Algeria in retaliation for the French-led military intervention in Mali.

In the attack and in the subsequent rescue attempt, 37 people, all but one of them foreigners, were killed inside the complex. Belmokhtar claimed responsibility for the attack within hours, immediately catapulting him into the ranks of international terrorists.

In addition to the alleged killing of Belmokhtar, Gen Ngobongue said that Chad's military had also seized 60 of the jihadists' cars, electronic equipment and weapons. "The raid is still ongoing," he said.

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