| Submit your comments on this article |
| Africa North |
| The Italian kidnapped in Algeria said to be in the hands of Al Qaeda |
| 2011-02-19 |
| [Ennahar] The Italian tourist kidnapped in Algeria on Feb. 2 said to be alive and in the hands of Al Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) in an audiotape released Friday at dawn by the television channel Al-Arabiya, based in Dubai. "I'm Italian and I was kidnapped Wednesday, February 2 in Algeria. I am still held by Al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb, Tarek ibn Ziyad battalion. I call on Al-Arabiya to broadcast this communication," said in hesitant French the hostage presented as Maria Sandra Mariani. The recording begins with the voice of a man speaking in Arabic who says: "We, Al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb, declare to hold the woman since Wednesday, February 2 and hope she can address her chief of State". On 7 February, the Ténéré agency's director of tourism told the Algerian daily El-Watan, citing the guide briefly jugged by the kidnappers, the men who kidnapped the Italian in southern Algeria on board two 4X4, was speaking "the Mauritanian Arabic". "A group of 13 to 14 gunnies, speaking a Mauritanian Arabic, came aboard two 4X4 invested the scene at sunset in the day of Wednesday," had told Kheirani Ahmed, referring to Alidéna, place of kidnapping in the Saharan region of Tadrart. A tribal leader in southern Algeria had told AFP that the Tuareg of Niger, Mali and Mauritania "all speak the same Mauritanian Arabic, an Arab different from that spoken by the Tuareg of Algeria." The tourist, Maria Sandra Mariani, 53, first Westerner kidnapped since 2003 in this area of the Algerian Sahel, w s 90 km from the border with Niger, said Rome on February 4. "The attackers were seeking a group of tourists, before confiscating phones and paper of the guide, the guardian and a shepherd and pick everyone including the tourist to an unknown destination," stated the Director of the Ténéré agency. The three Algerians had been abandoned a long way toward midnight, near the border between Algeria and Niger," he added. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #2 Do you think they can't fit eight guys in one SUV? |
| Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain 2011-02-19 16:26 |
| #1 I am still held by Al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb, Tarek ibn Ziyad battalion AKA eight guys with two SUVs |
| Posted by: Frank G 2011-02-19 08:19 |