Narrative
Narrative of the Organization's History
Narrative of the Organization's History
Leadership, Name Changes, Size Estimates, Resources, Geographic Locations
Ideology, Aims, Political Activities, Targets, and Tactics
First Attacks, Largest Attacks, Notable Attacks
Foreign Designations and Listings, Community Relations, Relations with Other Groups, State Sponsors and External Influences
Mapping relationships with other militant groups over time in regional maps
AQIM is a Salafi-Jihadist organization. As the GSPC, the group’s main focus was the overthrow of the Algerian government and establishment of an Islamic caliphate in the Maghreb that would enforce Shariah law.[45] The GSPC expanded this goal in the early 2000s to include the overthrow of the governments of Mauritania, Morocco, Tunisia, and Mali, and the reclamation of lost Islamic lands in southern Spain.[46] Despite its alliance with AQ in 2006 and name change the following year, AQIM’s goals did not shift dramatically. Unlike AQ Central, AQIM considers France and Spain, not the United States, the “far enemy,” and prefers to target regional governments over western nations.[47] Although AQIM has often threatened to attack France and was quick to praise the Charlie Hebdo massacre in 2015, there is no evidence that AQIM has perpetrated any attacks outside the Maghreb region. It has, however, publicly expressed support for Islamist extremism in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Chechnya, and Palestine.[48]
AQIM has no known political activities.
AQIM is most famous for numerous kidnappings of aid workers, diplomats, tourists, and employees of multinational corporations. Many, but not all, of those kidnapped have been western citizens in Mali, Mauritania, Niger, and Algeria.[49] Especially in its early days, AQIM often perpetrated guerilla-style attacks using small arms, in addition to mortar, rocket, and IED attacks.[50] Its most common targets were the Algerian government or military officials. After 2007, the group began to focus on larger, more sophisticated bombing attacks. The group is known to possess significant quantities of AK-47 assault rifles, various small handguns, Semtex (a multi-purpose plastic explosive), PK 7.62mm GPMGs (General Purpose Machine Gun), and RPGs (Rocket Propelled Grenades). Additionally, AQIM has been reported to possess SA-7 surface-to-air missiles, .50 caliber DSHKs (armor-piercing machine guns), and NATO-issued F2000 assault rifles. The group’s weapons stores have only increased since the outbreak of civil war in Libya in 2011, which brought an influx of arms to the Maghreb region from the disbanded Islamic Legion in Libya.[51]
Although AQIM has often targeted westerners in North Africa, the group has never carried out an attack outside of the region. Although undoubtedly hostile to the U.S., AQIM views France and Spain as the “far enemy,” as opposed to the secular governments of the Maghreb, which it deems the “near enemy.”[52]
Disclaimer: These are some selected major attacks in the militant organization's history. It is not a comprehensive listing but captures some of the most famous attacks or turning points during the campaign.
April 2003: Belmokhtar took 32 Europeans hostage in Northern Mali. AQIM received ransom payments totaling $6 million for all but one of the hostages. The remaining hostage died in the desert of unspecified causes (1 killed, 0 wounded).[53]
September 2007: AQIM claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing attack in the Algerian city of Batna that was aimed at the motorcade of Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika. Although the president was not injured, 20 others were killed (20 killed, unknown wounded).[54]
December 2007: AQIM conducted simultaneous bombing attacks on the Algerian Constitutional Court, UN Regional Headquarters, and a police station (47 killed, 60+ wounded).[55]
December 2008: AQIM abducted UN Special Envoy, Robert Fowler, and his assistant, Louis Guay, in Niger. They were released in 2009 (no casualties).[56]
March 2012: Following a coup in Mali launched by Tuareg insurgents, AQIM, Ansar Dine, and MUJAO, launched an offensive in Mali, eventually taking control of Northern Mali (unknown casualties).[57]
May 31, 2015: AQIM claimed responsibility for a mine that was triggered by a U.N convoy in Mali that included the U.N. Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA)’s commander, Major General Michawl Lollesgaard and the mission’s police chief, Abdounasir Awale (3 killed, unknown wounded).[58]
November 11, 2015: Al Mourabitoun and AQIM fighters opened fire on the Raddison Blu Hotel in Bamako, Mali and took 170 people hostage, who were rescued later in the day, and demanded the return of detainees held in France (22 killed, 2 wounded).[59]
January 15, 2016: AQIM, working with Al Mourabitoun gunmen, seized the Splendid Hotel in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, firing on local businesses and taking over 200 hostages. The Burkinabe military, aided by French troops, freed 126 hostages in a counterassault (29 killed, 56 wounded).[60]
January 18, 2017: AQIM claims responsibility for a suicide bombing launched by Al Mourabitoun agents at a joint French-UN military base outside Gao, Mali, housing Malian soldiers and rival armed groups (77 killed, 115 wounded).[61]
June 30, 2018: JNIM, the umbrella organization including AQIM, claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing of the Malian headquarters of the G5 Sahel, an international anti-terror taskforce. Two soldiers and a civilian were killed (3 killed, unknown wounded).[62]
Although AQIM has extensive business ties with local communities and cooperates closely with locals in its smuggling and trafficking activities, the communities tend to be less receptive to radical and violent Islamism than other parts of the Arab world. Furthermore, views of the United States and the West tend to be positive among West Africans, further reducing the impact of AQIM’s radical messages.[69]
AQIM began in 1998 as a splinter group from the now-defunct Armed Islamic Group (GIA), the largest and most brutal Islamist group fighting the Algerian government in the Algerian civil war. In 1998, several GIA leaders feared that the group’s violent tactics were alienating the GIA from Algerian citizens, leading to the formation of the Salafist Group from Preaching and Combat (GSPC).[70]
AQIM has conflictual relations with Djamat Houmat Daawa Salafia (DHDS), another GIA splinter group, which took control of part of GSPC’s support networks beginning 1999, in order to acquire more sources of funding.[71]
AQIM’s relationship with Al Qaeda (AQ) dates back to the 1980s, when many future leaders of AQIM fought alongside bin Laden and the Mujahedeen in Afghanistan.[72] Although Sahraoui nominally pledged the GSPC’s allegiance to AQ in October 2003, the two groups only became formally affiliated on September 11, 2006. The GSPC did not change its name to Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb until January of the next year.[73] Often termed a franchise agreement, the AQIM-AQ affiliation has seemingly little to do with ideology and much more to do with monetary and strategic advantages conferred on each group. For the GSPC, joining AQ increased the organization’s international profile and boosted its recruitment capabilities.[74] For AQ, allying with the GSPC allowed it to expand to a new continent, demonstrating its resilience and continued power at a time when the global war on terror was reaching its zenith. Perhaps even more importantly for AQ, however, were the monetary resources the GSPC brought to the union. By 2006, the GSPC was one of the wealthiest terrorist organizations in the world, having raised tens of millions of dollars from ransom payments and trafficking of arms, drugs, and people through North Africa.[75]
Ansar Dine and the Mouvement pour l’Unification et le Jihad en Afrique de l’Ouest (MUJAO) are both believed to be splinter groups of AQIM, although the circumstances of their division remain unclear. Both Ansar Dine and MUJAO fought alongside AQIM’s southern battalions, led by Belmokhtar, in Mali in 2012. In December 2012, Belmokhtar and his southern divisions are believed to have split from AQIM as well, forming the Al Mulathamun Battalion (AMB).[76] AMB and MUJAO merged in August 2013 to form Al Mourabitoun, or “The Sentinels.” [77] In December 2015, Droukdel announced Al Mourabitoun’s merger with AQIM.
The U.S. State Department has claimed that AQIM coordinated and exchanged money, weapons, and information with al-Shabaab in Somalia, Boko Haram in Nigeria, and Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) in Yemen.[78]
AQIM has a complex relationship with the Islamic State (IS) due to the rift between AQ and IS. In July 2014, AQIM publicly congratulated the IS for its military gains in Iraq while simultaneously urging reconciliation between AQ, its affiliate in Syria and IS. In the same month, AQIM rejected IS’s declaration of a caliphate, reflecting internal divisions among AQIM’s leadership.[79]
On March 2, 2017, the Sahara branch of AQIM and Al Mourabitoun joined with Ansar Dine and the Macina Liberation Front (MLF) into the unified organization, Jamaat Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimeen (JNIM). The merger was allegedly in line with AQ’s recent conclusions that Shariah law could only be fully implemented in areas where jihadists possessed complete control. JNIM reportedly operates as a militant alliance with AQIM at the top; in a video explaining the merger, JNIM leader, Iyad Ag Ghali pledged allegiance to AQIM’s emir, Abdelmalek Droukdel.[80]
AQIM has no known connections with governments in the region or abroad.
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[75] Chivvis, Christopher S. & Andrew Liepman. “North Africa’s Menace: AQIM’s Evolution and the U.S. Policy Response.” RAND Corporation, 2013. Web. 28 Oct. 2015; “al Qaeda in the Lands of the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).” TRAC, Date unknown. Web. 27 Oct. 2015.
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