Interesting point that t.crickett raises. Perhaps someone who has the language skills can go back to the original article and see if there is any clarity. Details like this can easily become mudied in the translation. Particularly using the automated tools.

Suppose the interpretation is correct (i.e. unislamic of the tourist agency to be escorting a lone woman in the desert), then is it not unislamic for AQIM to be doing the same, against her will?

Certainly un-coranic attacking or abducting women, esp if they are alone. Only the most salafistic fanatics can justify this act, and perhaps the perpetrators will even encounter resistance from their own, which could hopefully lead to her release.
For the wahhabists of aqim the presence of any westerner in the Maghreb is an abomination and they/we are legitimate targets.

Straight from Djanet now:
"hier tout les agences chez la police pour relache le guide et le gardien aujourd'hui tout les jeunes font un ensemble devant la police pour la meme raison et tous dans leurs tetes de ne plus laisse arrive ça dans notre region
ciao ami"

This is a brief comment on being 'found' in the desert. Last time I was in Djanet it was just before the Austrian kidnapping in Tunisia (2008). So it had been 5 years since the last kidnapping in Algeria. I was in my own vehicle with a guide. There was only one vehicle. I did the usual things to keep my intentions secret. First, we refueled as soon as we got to Djanet and then we spent another few days in town. We were ready to leave at any time during that period because we had all the things we needed from the start. I didn't tell anyone, including our guide, what the plans were. Then we left for Mount Tiska which is 100 km or so from the area where the most recent kidnapping (Feb 2011) happened. We kept a low profile and found a quiet, secluded valley on the south side of Mount Tiska and slipped in mid to late afternoon. We then went for a walk on the mountain. Once we were quite high on the mountain, two vehicles came in to the campsite - travelling fast. Guys in one of the vehicles covered the other with their rifles while the lead vehicle went in to check things out. Out guide emerged from behind a rock. There were discussions and the vehicles left 15 minutes later. It turned out these were the gendarmarie. The thing that surprised me was the ease with which we were tracked to the campsite. It made me realise that even with our careful plans to keep things secret, we could do nothing about the big XS tyre tracks we were leaving behind.

I have also been thinking about how to remove tracks in the sand - - have to ask the guides how to do it.
But a good desert scout could probably track you down anyway.

Malian president talks about Pierre Camatte in leaked cables
WikiLeaks: President of Mali Links Drug Trafficking to Terrorism | Middle East news, analysis, opinions | the Crethi & the Plethi

In relation to my earlier speculation, the taking of the woman tourist has now been described as an 'error'

Algeria tourist kidnapping called an error - UPI.com

The kidnappers "weren't looking for her but for a group of tourists they had been informed about," Ahmed Kherrani told ANSA.
"When the kidnappers came to the camp at Alidena, they asked about a group of tourists," he said. The woman's guides tried to hide her whereabouts, but the bandits found her.

It has been 10 days since the Italian woman was kidnapped in Algeria.
This is one of the longest delays between capture and acknowledgement of kidnapping by AQIM.

Approximate length of delay for other cases are:
10 days (festival kidnapping near Niger/Mali border)
9 days (Spanish in Mari)
1-2 days (Pierre Kamat, Menaka)
2-3 days (Michel Germaneau)
15 days (Arlit)
The case of the Austrians in 2008 is hard to pin down - I don't know the actual date they were taken.

There seems to be a relationship between the distance from the AQIM camps to the location of the kidnapping and the length of delay until AQIM claim responsibility.
In the latest case (the Italian woman in Algeria), it is quite a long way from SE Algeria to NE Mali. But 10 days is still a long delay. I'm wondering if the AQIM leaders are discussing how to deal with a woman on her own.
Also, in the previous case (Arlit) AQIM did not release publically the grand demands that they have in previous cases. If we don't hear something soon about the Italian woman, it may be the case that AQIM have changed their established protocols of grand announcements and demands.

Yes, let's hope for her release. This is the vilest act so far committed by Aqim.

Djanet is suffering.
Algeria: Foreign tourists leave early following kidnapping of Italian - Adnkronos Security

Editorial in NY Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/18/op...enjamin18.html

The deaths of four Americans on board a yacht offshore Oman was reported today. They had been taken hostage by 15 Somali pirates who then forced the yacht to sail towards the Somali coast. The yacht was shadowed by a US warship. The fours Americans were killed by the pirates. The US Navy reports that they heard gunfire and decided to board the ship and by the time they arrived the four Americans had been shot. The captured pirates claim they were attacked first and the pirates then killed the hostages.

There could have been little incentive on the part of the pirates to kill their hostages. The hostages are the pirate's safe passage to Somalia (their human shield) and they are their ticket to riches once the pirates get the hostages to dry land. Once dead, the hostages are of no use to the pirates at all.

The story is a remarkable parallel to the Niamey incident in which the two young Frenchmen died. They were taken hostage, followed by aircraft and chopper and were most likely killed by their kidnappers as the French army closed in.


Could it be the case that the way western powers have decided to approach these incidents has changed? Once the hostages are in captivity in the kidnapper's lair it seems impossible for the western powers to do anything other than pay the ransom. The ransom makes further attacks more likely. Could there be the recognition by western powers that the only option is to strike at the beginning? If so, it does not bode well if you are the one taken hostage.

In the history of rescue missions there is much more failure then success. It only works well in Hollywood.
The French botched a rescue off the Somali coast when they shot the French skipper; then Niamey.
Americans - I think of Teheran -79.
Russia - the horror of the school in Beslan, or the theatre in Moscow.
Mossad have a better track record, but generally speaking I think if kidnapped one should pray there will be no rescue attempt.

According to NY Times there were negotiations taking place on a US Navy ship "but the talks seemed to unravel on Tuesday morning, when a pirate aboard the Quest fired a rocket-propelled grenade at the destroyer. Almost immediately gunfire erupted from inside the yacht’s cabin, Admiral Fox said, and several pirates then stepped up to the bow with their hands up."

As far as kidnappings go, AQIM has so far stayed out of Libya. Whatever has been keeping them out is likely to have changed now.

Kidnapping isn't new to North Africa. I am reading an essay about kidnapping and slave trade in the 15th through 19th century. Up to one million Europeans of whom 1,000 were Swedes were taken from ships and from raids along the coasts. They were then sold off to become galley slaves, labor force, mercenaries or concubines. Or they were kept hostage, being released when a ransom was paid. Even as far away as Sweden, people were donating money in the churches to free the slaves on foreign soil.
The pirate ships came from the Barbary Coast, with the three main ports Algiers, Tunis and Tripolis. The pirates were named corsairs, and it is being described in the essay as a result of the warfare instigated by the crusaders against muslim nations.
(Personally I think that piracy and slavery goes further back than that - not all evil originates from Europe).
Not only the Meditarranean coasts was scavenged by pirates, they went far north in Europe to plunder. In one famous attack on the Icelandic Westmannaeyar in 1627 three pirate ships from Algiers killed 34 and kidnapped 242 out of a population of 500. A local priest wrote a detailed account, Ólafur Egilsson - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Even if this was off-topic, there are some interesting parallells to what Aqim is doing today.
Research projects - Cultural Sciences Lund University

For 9 months, no westerner has been kidnapped by AQIM in the Sahara making this the longest hiatus since the kidnappings resumed in 2008. AQIM have been responsible for 10 episodes since early 2008.

The reasons might include:
1) AQIM may have their hands full with the 5 hostages (Arlit and SE Algeria) still in captivity.
2) The French hostages taken in Arlit have been held longer than any since the kidnappings began in 2003. Quick payments are not being made.
3) There are not many western tourists to take - certainly true of the desert in Niger, Mali, Mauri and Algeria.
4) AQIM have been busy fetching arms in Libya and developing strategies for Libya post Gadaffi - watch that space.
5) AQIM has been pushed out of Mauri - Where most of the saharan tourists currently go.
6) They are about to make their next move?

and developing strategies for Libya post Gadaffi - watch that space...

that's what our friend Keenan thinks according to a rambling article on al jazeera I read the other day. 'Nightmare scenario in the Sahel'.

And not just AQIM ('pawns of DRS/USA' acording to JK), but the Tuaregs too (as I mentioned elsewhere from another source).

You do get the feeling that the south of Libya could easily become like the north of Mali (or the far northeast of Niger, back in the day), unless they get down there quick and lay down the law.
But securing the remote south (for desert tourism among other things - and if it indeed needs securing) is probably not a priority with all that needs doing up north.

Ch

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