Tensions flaring
Posted on 12/19/2011 7:28:42 PM PST by SunkenCiv
Bamako will "no longer accept the violation of its territorial integrity by the Polisario Front", a Malian Minister said on condition of anonymity.
Our country is not the Wild West where they can come to kill, and kidnap people and we have already made it clear.
Next time, we will take up our responsibilities," the Minister said.
For him, the "reasons for this intrusion do not hold water. The person who was killed and those who were taken hostage have nothing to do with the kidnappers of European hostages taken in Tindouf", West of Algeria.
Armed men from the Polisario Front -- a group seeking the secession of Western Sahara from Morocco -- killed a man and abducted three others in northern Mali, local officials said Thursday.
A Malian security official said that the man was killed "in a vendetta on Malian territory by Polisario forces," identifying the victim as Mohamed Yeyia Ould Hamed, aka 'Double Head'.
The official said Polisario was claiming to exercise its right of pursuit to catch gunmen linked to Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). But the official argued the killing was in fact the result of a vendetta between rival smugglers.
The incident took place in El Hank, in the district of Timbuktu, some 70 kilometres (40 miles) from the Algerian border, the official added without saying when it happened.
Mohamed Ould Taher, a local elected official, said one of the abductees was his nephew, who had no links with AQIM.
(Excerpt) Read more at middle-east-online.com ...
Tensions flaring
A map of the Sahel region showing where Al Qaeda operates (AFP/Graphic)
I will admit to going to an atlas for this one.
I thought it was going to be about a tiff between Bambi and Pelosi.
The next superpowers...
>> I will admit to going to an atlas for this one.
After 1-1/2 years in Africa, not me. Same country as Timbuktu. Guess you don’t know where Ouagadougou, Nouakchott, or Nouadibou are either... ;o)
I’m an old Africa hand. You got me with Nouadibou. Must be in Mauritania as well as Nouakchott. ((I’m also an old radioman. QRU ZNN SK.))
I know the back woods of New England pretty well. Africa...not so much. But I got me edumatcated this morning!
Good to get educated....maybe we will see questions at the next pubbie Debate/
Yeah...I am sure they all know where this is.
I wouldn’t put any ideas into the future debate hosts’s minds. One of them might try to pull off a quick one on the candidates.
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