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Tag: al-Qaeda

  • US revokes ‘terrorist’ designation for Syria’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS)

    US revokes ‘terrorist’ designation for Syria’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS)

    The United States on Monday announced it was revoking its “foreign terrorist organization” designation of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a group once linked to Al-Qaeda that toppled Syria’s government in December.

    “In line with President (Donald) Trump’s May 13 promise to deliver sanctions relief to Syria, I am announcing my intent to revoke the Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) designation of al-Nusrah Front, also known as Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS),” said US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in a statement.

    An armed coalition led by HTS leader Ahmed al-Sharaa overthrew then-Syrian president Bashar al-Assad last year, ending half a century of brutal rule by the latter’s family.

    Sharaa took over as interim president, a move that has been cautiously welcomed in Washington, Europe and elsewhere, with historic foe Israel seeking to build ties with the new government.

    Washington’s move will formally take effect on Tuesday, and comes after US President Trump last week formally dismantled his country’s sanctions against Syria.

    “Tomorrow’s action follows the announced dissolution of HTS and the Syrian government’s commitment to combat terrorism in all its forms,” said Rubio.

    HTS was earlier known as Al-Nusra Front, and was formerly the branch of Al-Qaeda in Syria, but it broke ties with the jihadist group in 2016 and sought to soften its image.

    As of 2017, HTS claimed control of swaths of the province of Idlib, in Syria’s northwest, and went on to develop a civil administration in the area, amid accusations of brutal abuses against those who dared dissent.

    In January, after overthrowing Assad’s regime, the new authorities announced the dissolution of all armed factions, with some groups including HTS being integrated into bodies such as the country’s new police force.

    Trump had lifted most sanctions against Syria in May, responding to appeals from Saudi Arabia and Turkey to help reintegrate the war-battered country into the global economy.

    The United States had already removed a bounty on Sharaa’s head after he came to power.

    – International reengagement –

    On Friday, Syria said it was willing to cooperate with the United States to reimplement a 1974 disengagement agreement with Israel.

    The United States and European countries have moved steadily to reengage with Syria since Sharaa took over as interim president, with Britain reestablishing diplomatic ties on Saturday after more than a decade.

    Britain has also lifted sanctions on Syria’s interior and defense ministries, as well as on various media groups, intelligence agencies and some sectors of the economy.

    The Assad regime was toppled after more than 13 years of civil war by a rebel offensive led by Sharaa.

    The rebellion was sparked in 2011 by protests against the Assads’ brutal rule that were part of the Arab Spring movement.

    The growing international backing comes as Syria’s new leaders attempt to rebuild the country and reboot its moribund economy, both ravaged by the conflict and crippling sanctions.

    From wanted jihadist to statesman embraced by world leaders, interim president Sharaa has undergone a stunning transformation in just six months.

    He now leads a government through a five-year transitional period under a temporary constitution that experts and rights groups say concentrates power in his hands.

  • Benin tensions with Burkina, Niger open door for jihadists

    Benin tensions with Burkina, Niger open door for jihadists

    Diplomatic tensions between Benin and its junta-led Sahel neighbours Niger and Burkina Faso have led to a security vacuum which jihadists are exploiting with ever-deadlier attacks.

    North Benin, which borders both Niger and Burkina Faso, has seen a recent rise in strikes targeting army positions, with an attack last week claimed by Al-Qaeda-linked Islamists killing 54 soldiers, the deadliest toll given by officials so far.

    Benin’s government has blamed those attacks on a spillover from Niger and Burkina Faso, both ruled by army officers who took power in coups on the promise of quashing the Sahel region’s long-running jihadist scourge.

    But with Niger and Burkina Faso’s juntas accusing Benin of hosting army bases for Western powers hoping to destabilise them — accusations Benin denies — there is little collaboration between the two sides on tackling the issue.

    “If Benin goes it alone and there is no response from the other side, it will remain in a state of crisis, with terrorist groups having found an El Dorado on its borders,” Beninese political scientist Emmanuel Odilon Koukoubou at the Civic Academy for Africa’s Future, a think tank.

    The Beninese government shares that view.

    “Our situation would be much easier if we had decent cooperation with the countries which surround us,” government spokesman Wilfried Leandre Houngbedji said on Wednesday.

    “If on the other side of the border there were (security) arrangements at the very least like ours, these attacks would not take place in this way or even happen at all,” he insisted.

    – World terror epicentre –
    Both Burkina Faso and Niger are located in the Sahel, a region of the world which saw half of 2024’s deaths from terrorist attacks, according to the latest Global Terrorism Index (GTI) published in March.

    For the second year running Burkina Faso took the top spot in the GTI’s list of countries worst affected by terrorism, ahead of both Pakistan and Syria.

    Niger meanwhile ranked fifth, just behind fellow junta-led Sahel ally Mali.

    “The growing presence of jihadists in the south of Burkina Faso and Niger along with the limited capacity of the armed forces of Sahel countries along their borders have allowed jihadist groups to create cells in territories like north Benin,” Control Risks analyst Beverly Ochieng said.

    And the forested areas of Benin’s W and Pendjari national parks near the borders with Burkina Faso and Niger “offer an additional layer of cover for jihadist activities”, Ochieng said.

    “With only limited aerial surveillance, Islamists can move about within these zones without being detected,” she added.

    The W national park was the scene of the April 17 attack which Benin said resulted in the death of 54 soldiers, though the Al-Qaeda affiliated Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM) claimed to have killed 70.

    The JNIM is “the most influential group” in north Benin, said Lassina Diarra, Director of the Strategic Research Institute at the International Academy against Terrorism in Jacqueville, Ivory Coast.

    This was “because there is a sociological, ethnic and territorial continuity with southern Burkina Faso, which is beyond the control of that state”, Diarra added.

    – ‘Difficult without cooperation’ –
    According to Control Risks’ Ochieng, “it is likely that the JNIM wants to use this area (of north Benin) to encircle Burkina Faso, thus reinforcing its influence and presence”.

    On Thursday a key regional bloc, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), again underlined “the imperious necessity of an indispensable and reinforced cooperation” to tackle the problem.

    But in a west Africa more fractured than ever, that is easier said than done.

    Besides turning their backs on the West, the junta-led trio of Burkina Faso, Niger and Mali have all pulled out of ECOWAS, accusing the bloc of being a tool for what they see as former colonial ruler France’s neo-imperialist ambitions.

    Banding together as the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), the three have created a unified army and conduct joint anti-jihadist operations.

    Yet the trio have closed off cooperation on rooting out Islamist violence to countries they consider too pro-Western, Benin and Ivory Coast among them.

    That said, the AES cooperates with Togo and, since December, Ghana, while Nigeria has mounted a diplomatic charm offensive to renew its security cooperation with Niger, suspended since the coup which brought the junta to power in July 2023.

    For its part, Benin needs to back up military action with social support, by stepping up community-building to prevent the mass recruitment of Beninese people into jihadist groups, according to the analysts.

    “However, this will remain difficult without cooperation from the Sahel, as this is where the root of the insurgency lies,” warned Ochieng.

  • Bodies found near Mali military camp after mass civilian arrests

    Bodies found near Mali military camp after mass civilian arrests

    Bodies were discovered near a Malian military camp days after the army and Russian mercenaries arrested dozens of civilians, witnesses told AFP Wednesday.

    Mali, ruled by a junta following coups in 2020 and 2021, has been grappling with widespread insecurity for more than a decade, largely fuelled by Islamist fighters linked to Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group.

    The country’s military rulers have broken their long-standing alliance with former colonial ruler France and turned toward Russia.

    The junta enlists the services of what it claims are Russian military instructors, but who — according to a host of experts and observers — are mercenaries from the private Russian company Wagner.

    On April 12, Malian army soldiers and Russian mercenaries arrested dozens of men at a market in Sebabougou, in the country’s southwest, and took them to the Kawla military camp, two survivors who fled to Mauritania said.

    A first witness recounted that he and other men were interrogated about their ties to jihadists, adding that “they whipped people”.

    He explained that Russian mercenaries took him and others out of the camp to be executed.

    “The white soldiers fired at us in bursts. I fell like the others. Very quickly, the soldiers left. I wasn’t dead, but I lay there for several hours. I saw nearly 70 bodies.”

    A second witness, who also fled the country, said he escaped death.

    “I was in the group that stayed (in the camp) when the others left to be killed.”

    A third witness said he went near the camp on Monday to look for his arrested relatives.

    “What we saw was terrible. Bodies, people killed, civilians,” he said.

    Like other witnesses and residents of Sebabougou, he fled to Mauritania.

    “They killed people for no reason,” he told AFP.

    A local community organisation told AFP Wednesday that they have “a list of 65 people who are now missing”.

    “They are mostly Fulani,” the group said, declining to be identified, adding that witnesses “discovered bodies scattered everywhere, in a state of putrefaction”.

    “They were only able to identify one person among them,” the local organisation said.

    The Fulani people are primarily nomadic herders. They are often stigmatised across the wider Sahel region, accused of collaborating with the violent Islamist groups.

    The Malian armed forces have stepped up operations in the centre of the country in recent months, along with Wagner.

    They are also accused of numerous abuses against civilians, particularly the Fulani.

    In February, around 20 civilians were killed in northern Mali when their vehicles were targeted by the army and mercenaries, according to local sources.

  • Three men accused of plotting 9/11 reach plea deal – Pentagon

    Three men accused of plotting 9/11 reach plea deal – Pentagon

    Three of the men accused of plotting the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks have entered into a pre-trial agreement, the US Department of Defence says.

    Khalid Sheikh Mohammad, Walid Muhammad Salih Mubarak Bin Attash, and Mustafa Ahmed Adam al-Hawsawi have been held at the US Navy base Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for years without going to trial.

    According to US news outlets, the men will plead guilty in exchange for the prosecution agreeing not to seek the death penalty.

    The terms of the plea deal have not yet been released.

    Nearly 3,000 people in New York, Virginia and Pennsylvania were killed in the al-Qaeda attacks, which sparked the “War on Terror” and the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

    They were the deadliest assault on US soil since the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour, Hawaii, where 2,400 people were killed.

    The deal was first announced in a letter sent by prosecutors to the families of victims, according to The New York Times.

    “In exchange for the removal of the death penalty as a possible punishment, these three accused have agreed to plead guilty to all of the charged offences, including the murder of the 2,976 people listed in the charge sheet,” said the letter from chief prosecutor Rear Admiral Aaron Rugh.

    The men have been accused of a litany of charges, including attacking civilians, murder in violation of the laws of war, hijacking and terrorism.

    They are expected to formally submit their pleas in court as early as next week, the Times reported.

    Khalid Sheikh Mohammad is widely considered the architect of the attack, in which hijackers seized passenger planes and crashed them into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon outside of Washington.

    A fourth plane crashed into a field in Pennsylvania after passengers fought back.

    Mohammad, a US-educated engineer, was captured along with Hawsawi in Pakistan in March 2003.

    Prosecutors argued that he brought his idea of hijacking and flying planes into US buildings to al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, and later helped recruit and train some of the hijackers.

    He was subjected to several “enhanced interrogation techniques”, including “waterboarding” – simulated drowning – at least 183 times before the practice was banned by the US government.

    In his letter, Admiral Rugh wrote that the decision to accept the deal was “not reached lightly” and was in the “best path… to justice”.

    In September, the Biden administration reportedly rejected the terms of a plea deal with five men held at the US Navy base in Cuba, including Mohammad.

    The men had reportedly sought a guarantee from the president that they would not be kept in solitary confinement and would have access to trauma treatment.

    On Wednesday, the White House National Security Council said the president’s office was told of the new deal and had played no role in negotiations.

    Jim Smith, whose wife died in the attacks, told the New York Post that families of victims had “waited 23 years to have our day in court to put on the record what these animals did to our loved ones”.

    “They took that opportunity away from us,” he said, adding they should receive the “highest penalty” for their roles.

    Republicans were quick to attack the Biden administration for striking a deal with the accused.

    Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell condemned the move as “a revolting abdication of the government’s responsibility to defend America and provide justice”.

    “The only thing worse than negotiating with terrorists is negotiating with them after they are in custody,” he said.