Suspected Al-Qaeda members kill Malian army officer

Posted by ThunderBolt on June 11th, 2009 No Comments Printer-Friendly

BAMAKO — Suspected members of al-Qaeda have killed a senior Malian military officer at his home in Timbuktu, members of his family and security officials said Thursday.

“A vehicle parked on Wednesday night in front of our house. Two armed men got out, two others stayed in the vehicle,” a member of Lieutenant-Colonel Lamana Ould Bou’s family told AFP by telephone. “Those who got out came into the house.”

“The lieutenant-colonel was sitting in the living room and one of the armed men told the other, ‘It’s him, it’s him,’ and pointed. That’s how they shot the lieutenant-colonel with three bullets.”

Al-Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) , (SITE Intelligence Group/Getty Images)

Ould Bou was an intelligence officer who had played a key part in the arrest of several members of al-Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) when they crossed Mali’s territory, according to both family and security sources.

Malian troops chased the killers immediately after the shooting, but they got away. “We strongly suspect al-Qaeda to be behind Wednesday’s murder of an officer in the Malian army in Timbuktu,” a security official in the northern oasis town told AFP.

Another security source said that the lieutenant-colonel had been wanted by the Islamic extremists for his role in the arrests. Tracking him down to kill him was the first attack of its kind in the largely arid, sub-Saharan nation.

“That’s symbolic. The Islamists have understood that Mali is firmly committed to the struggle against al-Qaeda. They killed an important figure who knew them well and whom they knew well,” said a foreign diplomat posted to Bamako.

“This is an act of war. We won’t leave it unpunished,” a Malian army officer said. The government recently announced a “pitiless struggle” against AQIM, after it on May 31 executed a British hostage, Edwin Dyer, who it had been holding since January.

Dyer was among a group of four tourists who were kidnapped by AQIM, which also seized two Canadian diplomats. Four of the six were freed in April, but Swiss tourist Werner Greiner is still in captivity.

AQIM, which claims close ties to Osama Bin Laden’s al-Qaeda, emerged out of Algeria’s hardline radical Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, and has sought to extend its range into Sahel nations on the southern edge of the Sahara.

According to SITE Intelligence, a US-based monitoring group, AQIM posted an online statement saying it killed Dyer in revenge for the detention of a radical cleric. (AFP)