Svensk UD-tjänsteman i gisslan – ”välbehållen”

Al-Qaida i islamiska Maghreb (AQIM) är en radikal islamistisk milis, verksam i Nordafrika där man vill upprätta en islamsk stat, byggd på sharialagar. AQIM har sin bakgrund i den Väpnade muslimska gruppen, Groupe Islamique Armé (GIA), som under 1990-talet bekämpade den algeriska regeringen. 1998 bröt en av officerarna, Hassan Hattab med GIA:s ledning, i protest mot de massakrer man utförde på civila människor. Hattab och hans anhängare organiserade sig i Groupe Salafiste pour la Prédication et le Combat (GSPC). I början av 2000-talet lierade denna grupp sig alltmer med al-Qaida, som tränat GSPC-soldater i sina träningsläger. Detta orsakade spänningar inom GSPC. Hassan Hattab som motsatte sig närmandet till al-Qaida avsattes som rörelsens emir och ersattes 2003 av Sheikh Abou Ibrahim Mustapha. En annan fraktion under ledning av El Para lämnade GSPC och bildade Fria salafistgruppen (GSL). 2006 uppmanade Hattab GSPC att lägga ner vapnen och acceptera den algeriska regeringens erbjudande om amnesti. GSPC:s dåvarande ledare Abu Musab Abdel Wadoud svarade med att istället tillkännage en "välsignad union" med al-Qaida, i kampen mot franska och amerikanska intressen. I januari 2007 bytte GSPC officiellt namn till det nuvarande Al-Qaïda au Maghreb islamique och har sedan dess utfört väpnade attacker och kidnappningar i Algeriet, Mauretanien, Marocko, Niger och Tunisien. Man har också engagerat sig i konflikten i Mali 2012, tillsammans med Ansar al-Din som leds av Iyad Ag Ghaly, kusin till AQIM:s nuvarande ledare Hamada Ag Hama.

Al-Mourabitoun (Arabic: المرابطون‎ al-Murābiṭūn; "The Sentinels") is an African militant Jihadist organisation formed by a merger between Ahmed Telmissi's Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa and Mokhtar Belmokhtar's Masked Men Brigade. Al-Mourabitoun is composed mostly of Tuaregs and Arabs from the northern Mali regions of Timbuktu, Kidal and Gao, but also includes Algerians, Tunisians and other nationalities. Its area of operations is in the north of Mali, near towns such as Tessalit and Ansongo. Although the group's establishment was announced by Belmokhtar, the group's leader was said to be a non-Algerian veteran of the anti-Soviet jihad in Afghanistan and the 2002 battles against American forces in the same country, later identified by French Intelligence as an Egyptian known as Abubakr al-Nasri (al-Masri). Abubakr was reportedly killed by French Special forces in North Eastern Mali between 10 and 17 April 2014, as was senior commander Omar Ould Hamaha weeks earlier. The group is named after the Almoravids, a North African Islamic dynasty of the 11th and 12th centuries. The group has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United Nations, Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom and the United States. On 14 May 2015, Adnan Abu Walid Sahraoui released an audio message pledging the group's allegiance to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). Belmokhtar issued a statement several days later rejecting this pledge and stating that it had not been approved beforehand, seeming to indicate a split in the group. On 20 November 2015, Al-Mourabitoun claimed responsibility for an armed, non-Kidnap for Ransom (KFR) attack on the Radisson Blu hotel in Bamako, the capital of Mali. This attack came one week after the November 2015 Paris attacks by individuals associated with Daesh... leading to speculation the two were related.