Word: maghreb
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...region? Two reasons are terrorists and drug smugglers, who have been attracted to West Africa by its weak governments and whose presence has weakened them further. First, the region has become a staging ground for operations by militant Islamists calling themselves al-Qaeda in the Land of the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), a group largely made up of Algerian fighters who fled south in the late 1990s after losing a decade-long war against the government. AQIM specializes in the kidnapping - and occasional execution - of foreigners, something that prompted the Paris-Dakar rally to move to South America last year...
...three years since allying itself with Osama bin Laden, North Africa's al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) militant group has worked hard to align its terror activities and communications with those of its radical parent organization. Topping the list of the techniques AQIM has borrowed from its brothers in the Middle East and South Asia is kidnapping Westerners to net big-money ransoms - or carefully choreographing their executions to shock the world. As the fates of several hostages hang in the balance in Mali and Mauritania, Western governments are grappling with how to deal with the growing problem: should...
French security officials have long regarded the Algerian jihadist movement al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) as the most immediate terrorism threat to Europe. Those fears appeared to have been substantiated last week with the arrest of a French physicist who is suspected of plotting terrorist attacks in Europe on AQIM's behalf. However, in an indication of the many options now open to aspiring radicals who want to put their extremism into action, investigators say the scientist linked up with AQIM only after police cracked down on another terrorist group he had been in contact with first...
...Pakistan and the Nigerian river delta. Violent protests against an enclave of Chinese workers in Algiers - resented for depriving locals of jobs and being insensitive to Muslim customs -convulsed the Algerian capital in August. Before the riots, a decree by a commander of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, a North African off-shoot of the terrorist organization, urged attacks on Chinese nationals across the region as revenge for China's heavy-handedness with the Uighurs. "An ideology is being built by the Al Qaeda leadership," says Gunaratna, "to create an image of China as an enemy of the Muslims...
...days and weeks there will be more attention, because it just started in the Arab media," says political analyst Rashwan, adding that Muslim organizations in the Middle East will also start to publicly voice support for the Uighurs. In the most extreme case yet, al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb this week called for attacks on Han Chinese in North Africa in retaliation for Muslim deaths. (See pictures of China after the riot deaths on LIFE.com...