Private Mauritanian news agency al-Akhbar on Tuesday said that it had received a video purportedly from the al-Qaeda-linked militant group Emirate of the Sahara claiming responsibility for this month’s kidnapping of Swiss woman Beatrice Stockly in northern Mali.
“We announce our responsibility for the kidnapping of this evangelizing disbeliever who, through her work, has succeeded in driving large numbers of Muslim sons from Islam,” al-Akhbar quoted a spokesman for the group as saying in the video, which was not broadcast.
In return for her release, the extremists called for the release of a number of their fighters jailed in Mali and one of their leaders, Ahmad al-Faki al-Mahdi — also known as Abu Tourab — detained at the International Criminal Court at The Hague, according to the agency.
Al-Mahdi is accused of ordering the destruction of historical monuments in 2012 in Timbuktu, Mali.
Tourab, who was a leader of the Al-Qaeda-linked Malian group Ansar Dine, is the first jihadist to appear before the war crimes court.
An official from the news agency told reporters that al-Akhbar had no plans to distribute the video.
It was the second time Stockly has been taken captive, following her kidnapping from Timbuktu in April 2012 by Muslim militants.
The social worker, who has lived in Timbuktu for years, was said at the time to be the last Westerner living in the desert city, which she refused to leave when it fell to Ansar Dine fighters on April 1, 2012.
Two weeks later, special forces from Burkina Faso swept into rebel-held northern Mali aboard a helicopter and whisked her to safety in a pre-arranged handover.
At the time a loose alliance of Tuareg and Muslim militant fighters took advantage of the political chaos in Mali’s capital that followed a March, 2012, coup by capturing the country’s vast desert north, including Timbuktu.
Stockly’s capture that year brought to 24 the number of hostages seized in the Sahel region, 20 of whom were held by Al-Qaeda’s north Africa branch, al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and another Muslim militant group the Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa.
Almost all were subsequently released, but three foreign hostages seized, a South African, a Swede and a Romanian remain in captivity.
After Stockly’s kidnapping in 2012, the Swiss Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it had discouraged her from living in Mali.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese