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alp227

(32,006 posts) Sat Mar 2, 2013, 08:27 PM Mar 2013

Algerian gas plant siege mastermind 'killed by Chadian forces in Mali'

Source: observer

Armed forces in Chad claim to have killed Mokhtar Belmokhtar, the commander of an al-Qaida-linked brigade which carried out a bloody assault to take western hostages at a gas plant in Algeria in January.

Belmokhtar died in a raid on an Islamist rebel base on Saturday, according to a military spokesman.

One of the world's most wanted terrorists, he had claimed responsibility for the strike on the In Amenas gas plant in which more than 60 people were killed after troops stormed the complex on 19 January.

In a statement read out on Chadian television, armed forces spokesman General Zacharia Gobongue said: "Chadian armed forces operating in northern Mali completely destroyed a terrorist base … The toll included several dead terrorists, including their leader Mokhtar Belmokhtar."

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/mar/02/algerian-siege-mastermind-killed-mali

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Algerian gas plant siege mastermind 'killed by Chadian forces in Mali' (Original Post) alp227 Mar 2013 OP

He was a gangster, more than some religious-zealot Kolesar Mar 2013 #1

Kolesar

(31,182 posts)

1. He was a gangster, more than some religious-zealot

Reply to alp227 (Original post)

Sun Mar 3, 2013, 09:54 AM

Mar 2013

"He is a pirate king of the Sahara," Jon Marks, a specialist in the region at the Chatham House thinktank, said after the gas plant attack. "But like most of these Algerian groups he mixes criminality with ideology, with the balance on either aspect depending on the circumstances."

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