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French and Chadian Forces killed AQIM commander Abou Zeid killed and captured seven militants, including one affiliated to the separatist movement of Polisario
Chadian President Idriss Deby Itno said on Friday that it was Chadian troops who killed Abu Zeid, one of the main leaders of Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.
According to Agence France Presse, Deby said the troops had clashed with jihadists in the Kidal region and “our soldiers killed two jihadist chiefs including Abu Zeid.”
Algerian security forces have reportedly taken DNA samples from Zeid’s relatives to compare with the body that is allegedly his, said the BBC.
A US official, speaking anonymously, told AFP that Washington thought the reports of Abu Zeid’s death were “very credible.”
Sources close to Islamist militants in northern Mali also confirmed there was no doubt Abu Zeid had been killed. Reports emerging on Thursday claimed that Zeid was killed by French airstrikes, and the sources cited by Reuters corroborated that version of events.
“The death of Abou Zeid has been confirmed by several of his supporters who have come back from the mountains,” said Ibrahim Oumar Toure, a mechanic in Kidal who worked with Islamist rebels, according to Reuters.
Besides that, French and Chadian forces have captured sever fighter associated to Abou Zeid, among them four Malians, one Mauritania, one Algerian, and fighter from the separatist movement of Polisario based in Tindouf – the south of Algeria- According to some French journalist-reporter from Le Figaro, France 24 and others confirmed that The Senior commander of AQIM, al-Qaida’s branch in north Africa, was killed with some 40 militants in northern Mali after French troops’ operation. However some dozens of terrorists were captured, among them one fighter from the Polisario separatist movement – based in Algeria-
Few days ago, on his side Malian foreign minister, Tiéman Coulibaly, confirmed the presence of “Polisario” fighters among the terrorist groups in Mali.
“In the beginning, they were only 500 insurgents. Now they are between 5,500 to 7,000 terrorists in northern Mali who were joined by lost youths, including young Sahrawis from the (Tindouf) camps,” said the Malian official in an interview with electronic site “AtlasInfo.”
Last week, Malian Prime Minister Diango Cissoko announced that large-scale military operations in his country “are coming to an end.”
