francoHFW
Diamond Member
The Tuaregs favor independence and had joined forces with better-armed Islamist fighters last year to take over much of Malis north. But the Tuaregs were soon edged out by their Islamist counterparts, who controlled the regions major towns and imposed a harsh version of Islamic law, cutting off hands, stoning a couple to death and beating people in the streets.
Now, with the rapid advance of the French military campaign to recapture northern Mali, the Tuaregs have vowed to help French forces fight the Islamist militants.
The main Tuareg rebel group, the M.N.L.A., announced that it had captured Mohamed Moussa Ag Mohamed, an Islamist leader who helped impose Shariah law in the city of Timbuktu. It also said it had seized Oumeini Ould Baba Akhmed, described as a leader of the Islamist group Mujao, the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa, which is a splinter from Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and responsible for kidnapping at least one French hostage.
The two men were captured on Saturday near the Algerian border by a patrol and taken to the northern city of Kidal on Sunday for questioning, said Mossa Ag Attaher, a spokesman for the M.N.L.A., speaking from Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. He said the French would be welcome to question the men.
The M.N.L.A. the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad, the Tuareg name for northern Mali now controls the northern city of Kidal, while French forces remain at the citys airport. The French are reluctant to move into Kidal with Malian soldiers, whom the Tuaregs regard as interlopers and who have been accused of human-rights abuses against Tuaregs. But French special forces are operating in the area, French officials said on Monday. The French are also pressing the government in the capital, Bamako, to open political negotiations with the M.N.L.A. to provide stronger autonomy to the north but within a united Mali.
Paris and Bamako have called on the M.N.L.A. to give up its aspiration for independence, but Mr. Attaher said that Tuaregs needed firm assurances that their rights and freedoms would be better protected and that they would have more political power.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/05/w...theyre-holding-militants.html?ref=todayspaper
Vive la France et Obama- A bas le GOP lol
Now, with the rapid advance of the French military campaign to recapture northern Mali, the Tuaregs have vowed to help French forces fight the Islamist militants.
The main Tuareg rebel group, the M.N.L.A., announced that it had captured Mohamed Moussa Ag Mohamed, an Islamist leader who helped impose Shariah law in the city of Timbuktu. It also said it had seized Oumeini Ould Baba Akhmed, described as a leader of the Islamist group Mujao, the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa, which is a splinter from Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and responsible for kidnapping at least one French hostage.
The two men were captured on Saturday near the Algerian border by a patrol and taken to the northern city of Kidal on Sunday for questioning, said Mossa Ag Attaher, a spokesman for the M.N.L.A., speaking from Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. He said the French would be welcome to question the men.
The M.N.L.A. the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad, the Tuareg name for northern Mali now controls the northern city of Kidal, while French forces remain at the citys airport. The French are reluctant to move into Kidal with Malian soldiers, whom the Tuaregs regard as interlopers and who have been accused of human-rights abuses against Tuaregs. But French special forces are operating in the area, French officials said on Monday. The French are also pressing the government in the capital, Bamako, to open political negotiations with the M.N.L.A. to provide stronger autonomy to the north but within a united Mali.
Paris and Bamako have called on the M.N.L.A. to give up its aspiration for independence, but Mr. Attaher said that Tuaregs needed firm assurances that their rights and freedoms would be better protected and that they would have more political power.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/05/w...theyre-holding-militants.html?ref=todayspaper
Vive la France et Obama- A bas le GOP lol
