The following from France24
Islamists 'destroy' mausoleums in Timbuktu
By News Wires the 23/12/2012 - 22:59
Islamists in Timbuktu renewed efforts to destroy the historic city’s remaining mausoleums on Sunday, three days after the UN backed an African-led military intervention to retake control of the country's north from al Qaeda-linked groups.
Armed groups occupying Timbuktu in
northern Mali used pickaxes on Sunday to smash up any remaining mausoleums in
the ancient city, an Islamist leader said.
The rebels' ruthless implementation of
their version of Islamic law comes just days after the United Nations approved a
military force to wrest back control of the conflict-ridden area.
"Not a single mausoleum will
remain in Timbuktu, Allah doesn't like it," Ansar Dine leader Abou Dardar
told AFP. "We are in the process of smashing all the hidden mausoleums in
the area."
Witnesses confirmed the claims, which
were also backed by a resident who said he belongs to Al-Qaeda in the Islamic
Maghreb (AQIM), another militant group occupying the fabled city since a March
coup plunged the west African state into chaos.
Anything that doesn't fall under Islam
"is not good. Man should only worship Allah," Mohamed Alfoul said of
the mausoleums, which the armed Islamists consider blasphemous.
The vandalism of the Muslim saints'
tombs in the UNESCO World Heritage site came a day after other Islamists in the
northern city of Gao announced they had amputated two people's hands.
The continued strict application of
sharia law is seen as a sign that the armed Islamist groups are unfazed by the
UN's green light for the African-led military operation.
Planners have said any intervention
cannot be launched before September next year. French Defence Minister
Jean-Yves Le Drian however said in an interview due out in Monday's La Croix
newspaper that he thought an intervention could occur in the first half of
2013.
In July, Islamists destroyed the
entrance to a 15th-century mosque in Timbuktu, the so-called "City of 333
Saints."
"The Islamists are currently in
the process of destroying all the mausoleums in the area with pickaxes,"
one witness said.
"I saw Islamists get out of a car
near the historic mosque of Timbuktu. They smashed a mausoleum behind a house
shouting 'Allah is great, Allah is great'," another resident told AFP.
Not only present in cemeteries and
mosques, the revered mausoleums are also found in alleyways and private
residences in the city, an ancient centre of learning and desert crossroads.
Ansar Dine first began destroying the
cultural treasures in July.
The International Criminal Court warned
their vandalism was a war crime, but the Islamists followed up with more damage
in October, when they smashed several Muslim saints' tombs, prompting another
international outcry.
The latest vandalism comes a day after
another Islamist group in northern Mali -- the Movement for Oneness and Jihad
in West Africa (MUJAO) -- said it had carried out amputations on two accused
robbers in the northern city of Gao, and warned of more to come.
Gao lawmaker Abdou Sidibe blamed the
amputations on the "international community's laxness", saying its
hesitation over whether to intervene to reconquer Mali's north was making Islamists
feel invincible.
"The international community needs
to know that it is its hesitation over intervening, or no, in northern Mali
that is encouraging the Islamists to show they are at home and are not afraid
of anything," Sidibe said Saturday.
On Thursday, the United Nations decided
to back the 3,300-troop operation to take back the Islamist-held region, though
the Security Council vowed to keep working towards a peaceful solution.
On Friday, two of the armed rebel
groups occupying the north -- including Ansar Dine -- denounced the UN approval
of the intervention force and vowed to cease hostilities.
But a Malian presidential advisor told
AFP that the statements contained nothing new.
Once considered one of Africa's most
stable democracies, Mali has for months been mired in the northern conflict
that has so far displaced more than 400,000 people, according to the United
Nations.
Meanwhile in Nigeria on Sunday, radical Islamist group Ansaru claimed
last week's kidnapping of a French citizen in the north of that
country. One reason he was targetted, said the group, was because of France's
push for military intervention in northern Mali.
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