Posted on 07/31/2004 6:59:26 PM PDT by blam
US forces hunt down al-Qa'eda in Sudan
By Damien McElroy, Foreign Correspondent
(Filed: 01/08/2004)
American special forces teams have been sent to Sudan to hunt down Saudi Arabian terrorists who have re-established secret al-Qa'eda training camps in remote mountain ranges in the north-eastern quarter of the country.
The terrorists, who are thought to take orders from Saudi Arabia's most wanted man, Saleh Awfi, have taken refuge in at least three locations in the Jebel Kurush mountains, which run parallel to the Red Sea coast of Africa's biggest country.
Two men walking as a storm kicks up orange sand at a refugee camp on the Chad/Sudan border
An American Delta Force officer, who recently spent a week in Sudan tracking the terrorists, said the camps are used to train new recruits to wage jihad, or holy war, against the West and its allies. The trainees are instructed how to handle weapons and build and transport bombs.
The officer said it was proving difficult to pin the terrorists down. 'We have a read on the rat-lines and the wider camp areas, but these are shifting camps in a very spread out part of the country. Our job is to tie them down tighter and tighter. They are moving pretty easily from their base points to the Red Sea coast, and then back and forth to Saudi. The Saudis are pretty annoyed about it.'
Awfi, according to the Saudi Arabian government, is a former prison officer and a veteran of al-Qa'eda training camps in Sudan in the early 1990s. He is believed to have moved on to Afghanistan before turning up in Iraq before the war last year. Now back in his homeland, he emerged as the local al-Qa'eda leader earlier this summer. Riyadh has launched a nationwide crackdown on terrorist cells after an amnesty expired last month but Awfi has evaded capture, even though he is believed to live in a safe house in the Riyadh area.
Western diplomats in Saudi Arabia said that the new Sudanese camps, which were established in the last nine months, have become a vital staging ground for al-Qa'eda. 'There is significant traffic from these camps to the peninsula across the Red Sea,' one said. 'There is no real Sudanese government or army control over the mountains. The terrorists slip through the cracks, up into the hills where they can train, rest and build up the spirit of jihad. With things getting hot over here, they can get organised over there.'
Al-Qa'eda had its headquarters in Sudan between 1992 and 1996 until Khartoum's Islamic regime succumbed to western pressure to expel the group and Osama bin Laden fled to Afghanistan. Two years later President Clinton ordered cruise missile attacks on al-Qa'eda camps in Sudan and Afghanistan.
Sudan has resisted western and Saudi Arabian pressure for it to deploy an army battalion in the Jebel Kurush, to flush out the al-Qa'eda presence. It has, however, allowed small teams of American soldiers to pass into the country as part of official visits, such as last month's trip by Colin Powell. A team of five special forces soldiers broke off from the Powell entourage for a week-long mission in the Kurush mountains, where aerial surveillance had established a list of villages where suspicious activity had been detected.
American forces are hunting a series of groups linked to al-Qa'eda across North Africa. Special anti-terrorist operations in Sudan and the Horn of Africa are undertaken by marines based in Camp Lemonier in Djibouti.
What a s#*@hole of a country, Makes Afghanistan and Iraq look positively first world. Good hunting, gents.
Ping.
bttt
Interesting read - I just wonder about the source - The 5 man team breaking off from Powell is exactly how many of these type surveillance missions are done on foreign lands....under the guise of an "official State" visit -
However, I just wonder why this would be leaked ...if true? I also wonder about operations in the Horn of Africa - We haven't heard of any "shooting" per say in that region involving American forces - So either it isn't happening....or we aren't leaving anyone around to "talk"?
The Sudan keeps popping up - again and again.
I am afraid that I also posted this piece.
A salient point pertains to another al Qaeda member, Awfi, being in prewar Iraq.
As you may recall, Sudan is alleged to have killed 30,000 and displacing millions in Darfur. They coincidentally head the UN Human Rights Committee.
Thanks for the ping.
Some time back we were posting that they were out in the middle of the Sahara Desert, guess not!
Problem easy to solve. Serve notice to Sudan, goodby. Sh--hole of a country anyway. Human rights so blatent why wait.
Go get 'em.
Thirty thousand? During the current outbreak of mass slaughter, maybe. I had heard about some strange goings-on in a montainous area of Sudan (a prime target for regime change)during the run-up to the Iraq War. A member of what was referred to as "the opposition" questioned what was happening in a remote mountainous part of the country which had been a guerilla training camp - after which he mysteriously disappeared. This caused me to wonder whether Saddam might not have taken advantage of the over-lengthy warnings he was given to shift any "smoking guns" to stash away there. Sudan was a natural ally, sharing as it does, Saddam's profound hatred of the US. But then, of course, a regime which orders its militia to chain human beings together then set light to them like a bonfire is capable of absolutely any base deed.
I heard that an older gal at our church had been the wife of some diplomat and had travelled all over the world. I mentioned to her later how exciting it must have been to travel all over the world as a diplomat's wife. She replied "Oh, he wasn't really a dplomat, he was CIA."
>They coincidentally head the UN Human Rights Committee
Yet further proof, if it were needed, of what a ludicrous organisaion the UN has become.
It has given Sudan "thirty days notice" before "imposing sanctions." How ridiculous can you get? (a) Sanctions take forever to "bite", by which time the foul deeds are all over. The UN somehow has to learn to get to the genocide zones immediately they come to light - and FAST. No more debating and droning on between expensve lunches as thousands perish.
Are our Special Forces safe in the Sudan now?
Yes, but, I wonder about everyone else.
Me too!
I noticed that piece of news. I'm very jaded by fellow human beings' penchant for hindsight not foresight, esp. since we've had NEVER AGAIN holocaust cliches for years. One wonders what took the French so damned long.
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