[Reagan is King]

Last year, Mr. Saifi received nearly $6 million in ransom from Germany for the release of kidnapped European tourists, money that he reportedly used to buy weapons and recruit fresh fighters in the desert stretching from Mauritania to Chad.

Sheesh, thanks Germany. Paying ransom to rebels and terrorists only results in more people killed and kidnapped.

[pepsionice]

The German government spent several months working up a deal to get the hostages of theirs released. The cash, strangely enough, was apparently NOT private money...but came straight from the giant tax revenue bucket (tax payers never said a word about this...but they really didn't grasp that it was public money, and not from the families). All the Germans involved were either tourists or on busienss in the region.

I would suspect that Libyans knew about the entire deal and helped make it happen. And the $6 million...probably disappeared down some Libyan official's private weapon sales enterprise.