Author: Damien Mcelroy, Foreign
Correspondent
Publication: The Telegraph
Date: June 6, 2004
URL: http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/06/06/wsaha06.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/06/06/ixworld.html
America has launched a secret war
against Islamic terrorists across the southern Sahara after it discovered
that a group linked to al-Qaeda bought heavy weapons using the proceeds
of a ransom deal with the German government.
The realisation that a new Islamic
fundamentalist force was building what officials call "garrisons in the
sand" on the border of Algeria and Mali has led America to launch a new
anti-terror campaign across a swathe of Africa's harshest and most sparsely
populated terrain.
The Salafist Group for Preaching
and Combat has spent about £4 million, which it received in return
for releasing 17 European tourists kidnapped last year, on surface-to-air
missiles, heavy machine-guns and mortars.
It also bought satellite positioning
equipment to enable it to conceal and later return to weapons caches buried
in the sands of the Sahara.
Major Sarah Kerwin of the US Army's
European Command, which is responsible for north and west Africa, said:
"There are clear indications that Muslim extremists from the Middle East
and Afghanistan have moved into these massive open spaces, where they are
as elusive as if they were out at sea.
"They bring a new threat where they
can bury weapons in the sand, mark the exact position with their satellite
equipment, and then move off along the camel trails with other tools and
equipment."
As well as the Salafists, other
targets include the Morrocan Combat Group, which is held responsible for
the bombings in Madrid and Casablanca.
The US Army plans to spend $125
million (£72 million) over the next five years on its Trans-sahara
Counter Terrorism initiative, aimed at preventing groups allied to al-Qaeda
from establishing a foothold in the region.
American special forces are being
deployed discreetly in the region - which covers eight countries and thousands
of miles of desert - to train, advise and equip pro-US government troops.
In a significant breakthrough in
March, the US military helped orchestrate the ambush and capture in western
Chad of Amari Saifi, the Salafist group's leader.
Brahim Tchouma, for the Movement
of Democracy and Justice, the pro-US rebel group that is holding Saifi,
told The Telegraph that they were prepared to hand the former Algerian
paratrooper to America or its allies.
"They were only lightly armed and
travelling in two groups in areas controlled by our movement after a fight
with the Chad army. We have them and will hand them over. We want nothing
in return."
Plans for a handover have been stymied
delayed after objections from the military government in Chad, which opposes
official contacts with its rebel opposition, but US military officials
expect the problem to be resolved in the coming weeks.
The group is also believed to have
a terrorist presence in Europe. Its members have been arrested in Italy,
Spain and Germany for suspected terrorist activity.
Governments in the Sahara region
were furious when Germany approved payment of a €6 million (£4
million) for the hostages, who included Germans, Austrians and Swedish
tourists.
Berlin has never officially acknowledged
the deal, but it is widely believed that the government of Mali paid the
ransom in return for a promise of additional aid from Berlin.
A Western diplomat said: "This sum
was equivalent to 25 per cent of the defence budget of Niger last year.
That gives the extremists a huge boost, an advantage which they can exploit
to destabilise these governments.
"Once al-Qaeda-linked groups can
cause instability, or preferably chaos in a country, they have the ability
to operate freely within it."
