Al-Qaida-Linked Jihadists Claim U.N. Suicide Attack in Mali

A jihadist group led by al-Qaida-linked Mokhtar Belmokhtar has claimed responsibility for a deadly suicide attack on the United Nations in Mali, in a recording released Friday by Mauritanian news agency Alakhbar.

Two civilians were killed and nine peacekeepers from Niger wounded when a militant set off explosives as he attempted to drive into a camp used by the U.N.'s MINUSMA peacekeeping mission in Ansongo, in the northern region of Gao, on Wednesday.

The al-Murabitoun group said in an Arabic-language audio message it had targeted Niger nationals because of the participation of President Mahamadou Issoufou in the Paris demonstration against the jihadist attack on satirical French weekly Charlie Hebdo in January.

The group said the suicide bombing, was also an act of revenge for Niger allowing American and French troops on its soil.

Al-Murabitoun had claimed responsibility for the March 7 attack on a Bamako nightclub frequented by Westerners that left a Frenchman and a Belgian dead, as well as three Malians.

It described Wednesday's assault as "the second operation to avenge insults against the Prophet", referring to Charlie Hebdo's cartoon depictions of the Islamic prophet Mohammed.

Mali's government said a civilian MINUSMA worker and a child died in the attack, adding that the suicide bomber was also killed and 21 people, including the peacekeepers, were wounded.

Alakhbar regularly publishes statements said to be from al-Qaida-linked jihadists, which are never denied.

Divided into rival armed factions, plagued by drug trafficking and infiltrated by jihadist groups, Mali's desert north has struggled for stability since the west African nation gained independence in 1960.

The country descended into chaos in 2012 when an insurgency by Tuareg rebels led to a coup in the capital Bamako. Militants linked to al-Qaida then overpowered the Tuareg to seize control of Mali's northern desert.

A French-led military operation launched in January 2013 drove the extremists into the bush but the Tuareg rebels and Islamist militants remain active throughout the northeast of the country.

The Islamists have staged attacks on U.N. forces, with at least 35 peacekeepers killed since MINUSMA was deployed in July 2013 -- one of the highest tolls for a U.N. peace mission -- and more than 140 wounded.

- 'The Uncatchable' -

Al-Murabitoun was formed in 2013 by the merger of the Signatories in Blood group led by Belmokhtar and the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO), which had been highly active in the Gao region.

One-eyed Belmokhtar, a former chief of Al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), is wanted by the security services of several countries after allegedly masterminding a siege in January 2013 of an Algerian gas plant in which 38 hostages, including three Americans, died.

Branded "The Uncatchable", the jihadist is also thought to have been behind twin car bombings in Niger in May of that year that left at least 20 people dead.

He broke away from AQIM in 2012 and was involved in the fighting against Chadian forces in Mali before he was reported to have been killed in action in March 2013.

The reports, however, were never confirmed and he is now thought to have sought refuge in Libya after losing his stronghold in northern Mali.

He has been designated a foreign terrorist by the United States since 2003, with the State Department offering a $5 million reward for information leading to his capture.

MUJAO broke away from AQIM in mid-2011 with the apparent goal of spreading jihad further into areas of west Africa not within AQIM's scope.

It was one of a number of Islamist groups that occupied northern Mali in 2012, imposing a brutal interpretation of Islamic sharia law characterized by amputations, beatings and executions, before being ousted by the French.