State Minister, Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Ramtane Lamamra said Monday in Oran, that Algeria has recently participated in military maneuvers, a few days ago in South Africa as part of the fight against terrorism. 

Speaking after a meeting with his Angolan counterpart George Rebelo Pinto, Ramtane Lamamra said that “a few days ago, the AU Commission for Peace and Security recently held military maneuvers in South Africa, and Algeria has sent military units.”

“For the first time, African units took part in these maneuvers to prepare and adapt on the ground in case of terrorist attacks,” he explained.

In this context, the minister added that Algeria has deployed important airborne and air forces.

“The major problem we meet is that of rapid deployment. So, Algeria participated in the transport of the military units of West Africa countries to South Africa,” he added.

aps.dz

Algerian Defense Ministry said on Sunday that army troops killed a senior terrorist commander in a dragging operation conducted on Friday in the woods of Jijel province, 320 km eastern Algiers.

A defense ministry statement noted that forensics identified the killed militant as L. Abdelkader, nicknamed “Essoudeur,” leader of a terrorist group that committed several heinous acts in the region.

Abdelkader is considered among the first militants who joined terrorist fiefs in 1994.

The ministry also revealed that in the same operation four members of a terrorist support cell were arrested and three terrorist bunkers were discovered and destroyed.

Jijel is a province located in the eastern part of Algeria. It used to be a safe-haven for some armed groups in the nineties. After the government launched a reconciliation process, several militants laid down arms, while a few others are still taking refuge in the region.

xinhuanet.com

Western officials are seeking authorisation for airstrikes against the so-called Islamic State on Libyan soil, to prevent the capture of the town of Ajdabiva, a town that is considered the gateway to the country’s oil wealth.

Western officials are seeking authorisation for airstrikes against the so-called Islamic State on Libyan soil, before militants capture the town of Ajdabiva, a strategically important town that is also considered the gateway to the country’s oil wealth, The Guardian reports.

According to the paper, fighting is currently raging in the town, and should the town fall it would give  Isis command of the Sirte basin, home to Libya’s largest collection of oilfields.

Strikes will not be launched until Libya issues a formal invitation, although British, American and French jets are on standby for strikes from bases across the Mediterranean. Military planners hope the authorisation will occur soon as hopes for a unified government have grown since a peace deal was signed in Morocco on Thursday between the House of Representatives of Tobruk and the General National Congress of Tripoli.

The Guardian reports that western officials fear that, without the strikes, success in the intensified bombing of Isis in Iraq and Syria will be reversed as IS would strengthen its forces in north Africa.

According to reports, the extremist militants are already regrouping around the world with volunteers from Sudan, Syria, Tunisia and Yemen moving to Libya to offer support.

US President Barack Obama said last Friday night that an American led coalition, targeting IS in Syria, Iraq and Libya simultaneously could ultimately defeat the group.

The Guardian reports that Ajdabiya was transformed in the late 1970s from backwater to boom town by the oil industry, and that its capture would leave Isis controlling a 150 miles stretch along the coast from its headquarters in Sirte and south through the oilfields.

The town has seen it fought over throughout history, with its capture by rebels in the 2011 Arab spring, shaping the fate of then leader Muammar Gaddafi.

The report indicates that artillery fire and street fighting reign supreme in the town, with hospitals running out of supplies.

The idea of the bombings, seeks to mirror the effects of Nato bombings in the country four years ago, in turning the tide in the fighting, with a vast armada on standby throughout the Mediterranean including in Italy and Cyprus among others.

Last week, pictures showing a 20-man special forces team, with desert buggies and surveillance equipment, being turned away from Wattiya, 30 miles from the Isis base at al-Ajaylat, near Sabratha, were inadvertently released, highlighting America’s presence in the country.

maltatoday.com

Eleven people have been killed in fighting in the eastern Libyan city of Ajdabiya between armed residents and fighters of al-Qaeda affiliate Ansar al-Sharia, the Red Crescent said on Friday.

Witnesses said clashes had raged since Wednesday in the city, which is controlled by the internationally recognised government based in the east of the country.

Red Crescent official Mansour Ati told AFP that civilians, including children, were among the dead, whose bodies had been taken to the city’s hospital.

It was not possible to say how many of the jihadists may have been killed, as Ansar al-Sharia does not take its casualties to the hospital.

A hospital spokesman added that dozens of people had been wounded.

Ajdabiya, 162 kilometres south of Benghazi, is located in a major oil-producing area. Since November, government personnel there have been targeted by a campaign of assassinations.

The Islamic State jihadist group, which controls late dictator Muammar Gaddafi’s hometown of Sirte, 360 kilometres to the west, have been trying to extend their influence to Ajdabiya.

UN envoy Martin Kobler issued a statement Friday in which he said attacks targeting civilians could be considered war crimes.

The North African country has been riven by chaos and warfare since Gaddafi’s fall in a 2011 NATO-backed revolt.

The United Nations has been brokering talks to create a unity government to end fighting.

Libya has had rival administrations since August 2014, when the Islamist-backed Fajr Libya militia alliance overran Tripoli.

iol.co.za

A 6,000-strong training mission led by Italy to Libya will see Britain sending in 1,000 troops, including the Special Air Service.

The plan is at the stage of examining how to send soldiers to help train Libyan security forces to fight terrorist taking over some region of the country.

The security vacuum in Libya has allowed ISIS to expand its so-called caliphate to the country.

Under plans being looked at, British military personnel would contribute to a 6,000-strong Italian-led mission to train and support local forces.

The deployment would mean boots on the ground in an area where six SAS men were captured during an operation in 2011, months before the death of Libyan Dictator Colonel Gaddafi.

Reported by RT Arabic, Ahmed Gaddafi Al-Dam – reported to be a cousin of former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi – claimed that IS militants have managed to steal chemical weapons from underground storage facilities in Libya that were not properly guarded and the gas has already been used.

“There are two known cases of this chemical agent being stolen. I know this from my sources in Tripoli. In the first case, seven drums of sarin were stolen, and in the second, I think it was five,” RT reports.

maltatoday.com.mt