Anti- terrorism fight should be on the long run: Algerian official

The African Union Security Envoy Ramdhane Laamamra has last week conferred with a group of high ranking Western Sahara officials in the province of Boumerdes, 65 KMS esat of Algiers, to discuss numerous issues dealing with security in Africa and most specifically in the Sahel and Maghrebena region

• Talking during his presentation on the efforts deployed by the Africans to face up to the Al Qaeda groups, whose activities are closely linked to the drug and arms’ smuggling, he said” Terrorism has become an inherent characteristic to the SAHEL and the African horn regions where the situation is alarming in Somalia; the area grew the favourite destination of Afghan militants and others from the African and Arab countries and even from European ones”
• He has vehemently condemned the amalgam made between terrorism and liberation movements in reference to some parties that labelled the Western Sahara movement as a rebellious movement, while the African Union is considering Western Sahara as a member of this organisation.
• M Laamamra has indicated that assimilating liberation movements to terrorism is meant by to shuffle the cards and called on the United Nations to forge ahead for sorting out the Western Sahara issue through exclusive negotiations Morocco.
• However, he warned against the dealing with terrorism as an occasional phenomenon indicating that the fight against it must be on a long run. He has asserted that the African Union considers terrorism as one of the dangers that undermines the stability of the continent.