Morocco News Board
AHMED CHAOUI
Washington / Morocco News Board— The sad (unconfirmed) news of the execution in Northern Mali of Mr. Taher Touati, the Algerian vice-consul in Gao, Mali, by a terror group called Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa [MUJAO] created a wave of indignation in the Algerian independent press.
Facing outrage from the Algerian public unhappy with their government’s response to MUJAO kidnapping of their diplomats in Gao, the Algerian official and semi-official press turned to their usual ,old and new, scapegoats to justify their political and military paralysis. The unfortunate, and at times disturbing, accusations by major Algerian news outlets, of Moroccan and Qatari involvements in the financing and support of the MUJAO.
The idea that Moroccans and Qataris are behind a terror group responsible for the killing of Mali civilians , and Algerian civil servant, is offensive to all. Yet, the Algerian government has not stopped this accusation from spreading in its official press organs. If the Algerian Military Intelligence Agencies had factual proof of Morocco’s involvement in the kidnapping of Algerian diplomats, the Algerian government would have taken the necessary measures to showcase it.
Spreading these rumors and innuendo are attempts by the Algerian military to mask their lack of an action plan on how to recover the kidnapped Algerian diplomats in the Malian desert. In addition, the Algerian diplomacy has been using this terror attack to refocus the world attention from the involvement of elements of their proxy guerilla movement, the Western Sahara Separatists Polisario front, in terror activities along the various criminal groups operating in the Algerian Sahara and the Sahel.
The recent decision of the right-wing Spanish government to bar its citizen from traveling to the Polisario camps located in the Algerian city of Tindouf was a big setback for the Algerian government attempts to rebuke what Algiers called baseless “Moroccan” accusation of Polisario fighters’ involvement in terror operations in the region. It is evident that Madrid’s decision to issue such warning was based on security assessments by Spain’s intelligence agency, the CNI. For the Polisario and their Algerian handlers, the fact that the “anti-Morocco” CNI issued such directive was a verdict on Algerian and Polisario failed security policies in controlling The Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and its affiliates in the Sahel and beyond. As the security and political situations keep deteriorating out of control in Mali, It is evident that the “Algerian terrorism problem” is turning into a regional insecurity conundrum threatening North Africa, the Sahel and sub-Saharan Africa. The Algerian military anti-terror “agencies” have lost control over the armed groups operating the region as inter-fighting among AQIM intensified creating sub-terror groups acting solo.
MUAJO is a group of former AQMI fighters ,mostly Algerian, who were not happy with their share of terror booty. In fact, MJAO is an Algerian problem that needs an Algerian solution. It is preposterous to suggest that Morocco and Qatar are behind such criminals. For the rest of the world, including European and American intelligence agencies, the facts on the grounds are lucid and the insinuations of Moroccan involvement are simply “laughable”.
Ahmed Chaoui is a Moroccan-America writer based in Virginia.
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