Paris concludes prisoner exchange deal with al-Qaeda in Mali, pays €30m ransom

Mustafa Kamel

A prisoner exchange deal was concluded between France and Jamaat Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimeen (JNIM), which is loyal to al-Qaeda, in which Paris played a major role after managing the hostage file, seeking to free those detained by the terrorist group. The deal came after many months of negotiations and resulted in 200 members of the terrorist group being released from prison, while Paris paid €30 million in exchange for the group releasing Malian opposition leader and veteran politician Soumaila Cisse and three other Western prisoners. The Malian government was merely a spectator with no role, which led the terrorist group to change its way of dealing after the French intervention.

Arduous negotiations

France went through arduous negotiations with the terrorist group in Mali, where it started managing the hostage file, which was assigned to the head of Malian intelligence. He was asked to include French aid worker Sophie Petronin in the deal, in addition to two Italian hostages, while the Malian government became a spectator. The file of the French hostage had been in the possession of mediator Ahmada Ag Bibi for more than a year, while Nigerien mediator Mohamadou Akwiti was working on the file of the two Italian hostages.

Akwiti is an influential figure from the Tuaregs of Niger. He works as an advisor to Nigerien President Mohamadou Issoufou. He previously played the role of mediator for the release of a number of Western hostages, the most prominent of them being the hostages of a French company in Arlit, Niger.

France entering the negotiations changed the way the terrorist group dealt with the file. Once it made sure that the French were the ones running the negotiations from behind a curtain and that Western hostages were on the negotiating table, it raised its demands.

The mediation began at the initiative of a businessman of Malian origin who has a special relationship with Cisse, as the government wanted to release Cisse to achieve political gains in light of a fraught electoral and political atmosphere. The intervention of businessmen led Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita to assign the file of the kidnapping to the prime minister and tasked him with entering into negotiations with the kidnappers, which meant searching for a reliable intermediary. At that time, the Malian businessman close to Cisse contacted the Mauritanian businessman Moustapha Ould Limam Chafi.

Sumptuous ceremony

Immediately after the return of the terrorist group’s members, they held a lavish ceremony. Iyad Ag Ghali, the current leader of the group, succeeded in achieving important political and material gains during this deal. But having his group strengthened with 200 experienced fighters, among them a number of prominent al-Qaeda leaders, was the biggest gain for him and his group in the midst of a fierce war against ISIS.

The group requested an amount of €10 million from each party (France, Mali and Italy) for a total of €30 million, in addition to the release of 200 members of the group held in Malian prisons, after it had previously asked for the release only 30. The parties agreed to the group’s demands, granting the group its first ransom since its establishment five years ago, which comes as it is fighting a fierce war against ISIS in a battle for influence in central Mali.

Among those released were five al-Qaeda leaders who were arrested by the French army on the border between Libya and Niger, in a region that is cut off from the world and is frequented only by dangerous people. They are accused of being involved in the attack on the Radisson Blu Hotel, which was the most dangerous attack to have occurred in Bamako, the capital of Mali.

Also among the released was a leader named Ibrahim, known by the nickname Fawaz, a Mauritanian who had previously participated in all the major operations launched by al-Qaeda in the Sahel and West Africa, including an armed operation in the Tevragh Zeina suburb in Nouakchott.

The Mauritanian terrorist also participated in planning an attempted bombing in the city of Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire. He was arrested accompanied by Egyptians, and now he left prison as part of the prisoner exchange deal