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...Lets start by stating the obvious: AQIM is not a product of the Arab Spring. AQIM exists because of the military coup that ended the 'Algerian Spring' two decades ago. And it has not been strengthened by the Libyan revolution, but rather by the failure of state-building in northern Mali, the absence of post-conflict reconciliation and reintegration in Algeria, and a lack of accountability for a shadowy Algerian security establishment whose brutal methods have proven woefully inadequate to the challenge. AQIM's real origins AQIMs history can be traced directly to the coup staged by a handful of Algerian generals against...

Mali has been a hotbed of Islamic extremism of late, as al Qaeda operatives have taken the West African nation by storm. As the country deals with an influx of violence, a presidential election is slated for this year — and there’s a fascinating candidate running for office. Yeah Samake, 42, a Mormon who was born and raised in Mali, is hoping to win the presidency and to save his homeland from the grips of extremism. Samake is currently one of the top candidates in the race — a democratic election that was pushed off last year after extremist activity...

A former US ambassador to Mali has told the BBC that France that paid ransom money to free hostages and the funds ended up bolstering Islamist groups it is now fighting. Vicki Huddleston said France paid $17m (£10.75m) to free hostages seized from a uranium mine in Niger in 2010. She said other European countries, including Germany, had also paid ransoms amounting to nearly $90m. France has always denied that it pays ransoms for the release of hostages. ... Ms Huddleston said the hostages kidnapped at the Niger mine in 2010 were only released because money had changed hands. "All...

'"Several hundred" Islamist militants have been killed since France launched an offensive in Mali last month, the French defence minister has said. Jean-Yves Le Drian said they had been killed in airstrikes and direct combat with French troops. Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius has said that France may begin pulling out of Mali as early as March. In a newspaper interview, he said that "if everything goes as planned, the number of troops should diminish". France has an estimated 4,000 troops in Mali and officials from multilateral institutions and dozens of countries have been meeting in Brussels to discuss how...

(CNN) -- France expects to begin pulling its troops out of Mali in March, the French foreign minister told the Metro newspaper. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said troops will continue operations in northern Mali, where he said "some terrorist havens remain." ... France has 2,150 soldiers in Mali and 1,000 more troops supporting the operation from elsewhere.

PARIS — French warplanes bombed Islamist militant bases and depots deep into northern Mali to disrupt their supply routes, French officials said on Monday, as secular Tuareg rebels in northern Mali said they had captured two Islamist commanders near the Algerian border. The Tuaregs favor independence and had joined forces with better-armed Islamist fighters last year to take over much of Mali’s north. But the Tuaregs were soon edged out by their Islamist counterparts, who controlled the region’s major towns and imposed a harsh version of Islamic law, cutting off hands, stoning a couple to death and beating people in...

(Reuters) - French warplanes pounded Islamist rebel camps in the far north of Mali on Sunday, military sources said, a day after French President Francois Hollande was hailed as a savior during a visit to the West African country. Thierry Burkhard, spokesman for the French army in Paris, said the overnight raids targeted logistics bases and training camps used by the al Qaeda-linked rebels near the town of Tessalit, close to the Algerian border. ... France says the rebels are also holding hostage in these mountains seven of its citizens, seized in recent years in the Sahara region. Malian military...

At least 12 men had hands or feet cut off after MUJAO (Movement for Jihad and Unity), and its allies in AQIM (al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb), took control of Gao last April. The exact number is not known because some were amputated in the military base... The mayor's office, a few yards from the punishment ground, was turned into a sharia court... Suspects were confined to a small room where they were tied up and beaten, before being brought before Islamic judges, known as marabous, who sat every Monday and Thursday. Ali Altini and Mohammed Aklini were due to...

France’s president, François Hollande paid a triumphant visit to this ancient city on Saturday, receiving a rapturous welcome from thousands of people who gathered next to a 14th-century mosque to dance, play drums and chant “Vive la France!” The muezzin, whose singing calls residents to pray five times a day, wore a scarf in the colors of the French flag as he shouted, “Vive Hollande!

The following video shows a French Foreign Legion (2e régiment étranger de parachutistes – 2eREP) paradrop into Timbuktu, Mali, from a C-160 Transal airlifter of the French Air Force. It was taken on Jan. 28, from the Infra-Red camera of a Harfang drone, supporting Operation Serval from Niger. The Harfang drones are the only French UAVs reportedly operating in West Africa. These ISR (Intelligence Surveillance Reconnaissance) platforms are about to be supported by a RAF Sentinel R1 deployed in Senegal.

Here is the crux of the argument and why an irrational Obama and the rabid left's ensuing power grab on gun control is utter madness. The Newtown school massacre was a known madman on a psychotic mission. Adam Lanza was a deeply sick and disturbed individual that had to medicated and home schooled and kept away from the general population. The problem was his violent lunacy. If he hadn't kill them with guns he might have killed them with bombs. The Toulouse school massacre was jihad as enshrined and commanded in the Quran. Holy war against the non-Muslims is a...

More evidence is emerging of alleged summary executions by Malian forces in the north of the country where French forces are completing their operations. An eyewitness told BBC Newsnight he saw three Islamic students shot dead in a public place because they failed to show identity papers. The Malian government has promised to investigate the allegations. It says there should be no revenge attacks against people suspected of collaborating with the rebels. But there are fears that militia due to be deployed to the north are seeking vengeance against Islamists and Tuareg separatists. The main allegations against the Malian military...

A jihadist website posted a new threat by al Qaeda this week that promises to conduct “shocking” attacks on the United States and the West. The posting appeared on the Ansar al Mujahidin network Sunday and carried the headline, “Map of al Qaeda and its future strikes.” The message, in Arabic, asks: “Where will the next strike by al Qaeda be?” A translation was obtained by Inside the Ring. “The answer for it, in short: The coming strikes by al Qaeda, with God’s Might, will be in the heart of the land of nonbelief, America, and in France, Denmark, other...

... The Star’s report Tuesday came from anonymous sources in the Defence Department. The CBC had to find out from French television that Canadian special forces are also operating in Niger, which borders on Mali. But then everything about Canada’s role in Mali is treated by Ottawa as a state secret. Canadians learned of the initial C-17 deployment only after Mali’s president tweeted the information on the internet. When that initial, one-week deployment was extended, we were first told not by our own government but by Mali’s ambassador to Canada. ... Meanwhile, who exactly are we fighting in Mali? The...

Hundreds of British troops will be deployed to Mali and West Africa, Number 10 has now confirmed. According to reports, approximately 350 personnel will be deployed. 200 British soldiers are expected to train soldiers in African countries outside of Mali, whilst 40 advisers are to be sent into the country to train troops. The UK would be "contributing to both Malian training and training forces that are involved in providing a regionally-led approach", a Number 10 spokesman was quoted as saying by the BBC. 70 Royal Air Force personnel are also to be used for the operation of Sentinel surveillance...

(Reuters) - France has ordered special forces to protect uranium sites run by state-owned Areva in Niger as the threat of attacks on its interests rises after its intervention against rebels in Mali, a military source said on Thursday. ... Seven workers, including five French nationals, were kidnapped in Arlit by al Qaeda's north African arm AQIM in September 2010. It later released three of the hostages but four French citizens are still being held. ... According to a parliamentary committee enquiring into France's supplies of uranium, about 18 percent of the raw material used to power France's 58 nuclear...

A banner showing al Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri and former emir Osama bin Laden is placed outside the French Embassy in Cairo, Egypt during a protest organized by Mohammed al Zawahiri. Image from Euronews. Within the past few days, Mohammed al Zawahiri, the younger brother of al Qaeda emir Ayman al Zawahiri, has threatened France and the West while condemning the intervention in Mali. The younger Zawahiri promised that if France and its allies continue to fight in Mali, then Westerners will be the "first to burn." During an interview broadcast by Euronews on Jan. 22, Mohammed al...

Military Pact With Niger Brings American Forces Closer to Conflict in Mali. The U.S. signed an agreement Monday with the West African country of Niger that clears the way for a stepped-up American military presence on the edges of the conflict in neighboring Mali. The U.S. and France are moving to create an intelligence hub in Niger that could include a base, near Mali's border, for American drones that could monitor al Qaeda-linked militants in Mali's vast desert north, U.S. officials said. The moves show the extent to which the U.S. and France are girding for what could be an...

David Cameron says UK will support French mission to drive Islamists out but insists forces will not engage in combat Britain is prepared to take the risk of sending a "sizeable amount" of troops to Mali and neighbouring West African countries as David Cameron offers strong support to France in its operation to drive Islamist militants from its former colony. As news emerged that insurgents retreating from Timbuktu had set fire to a library containing thousands of priceless historic manuscripts, Downing Street said the prime minister told François Hollande on Sunday night Britain was "keen" to provide further military assistance...

DIABALY, Mali (Reuters) - Residents of Diabaly feared for their lives when French air strikes pounded their small town in central Mali, shaking their homes and turning the pick-up trucks of Islamist fighters into burning, twisted metal. Despite that, they are grateful to France. Children in bare feet and tattered T-shirts now play among the trucks' charred wreckage -- a visible reminder that the town was the focus of the French-led war against al Qaeda-linked rebels bent on carving an Islamist state out of the Sahara. "I've told the children not to play with the trucks but I can't stop...