Analysis: Iran's unlikely al Qaeda ties: fluid, murky and deteriorating

By Myra MacDonald

LONDON (Reuters) - When al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri spoke in an audio message broadcast to supporters earlier this month, he had harsh words for Iran. Its true face, he said, had been unmasked by its support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad against fighters loyal to al Qaeda.

Yet it is symptomatic of the peculiar relationship between Tehran and al Qaeda that in the same month Canadian police would accuse "al Qaeda elements in Iran" of backing a plot to derail a passenger train.

Shi'ite Muslim Iran and strict Sunni militant group al Qaeda are natural enemies on either side of the Muslim world's great sectarian divide.

Yet intelligence veterans say that Iran, in pursuing its own ends, has in the past taken advantage of al Qaeda fighters' need to shelter or pass through its territory. It is a murky relationship that has been fluid and, say some in the intelligence community, has deteriorated in recent years.

"I wouldn't even call it a marriage of convenience. It's an association of convenience," said Richard Barrett, former head of counter-terrorism for Britain's MI6 Secret Intelligence Service and later head of the U.N. Security Council's monitoring team maintaining the world body's al Qaeda and Taliban sanctions blacklists.

"It's not a strategic alliance. An al Qaeda presence may suit the Iranians because it allows them to keep an eye on them, it gives them leverage in the form of people who are akin to hostages," he added.

"There has been a lot of travel between Iraq and Pakistan and I cannot imagine the Iranians are not aware of that," he said. But it was unlikely that Iran would take the risk of actively collaborating with al Qaeda against North America: "I don't think the Iranians would take it kindly if it turned out that there had been plotting by al Qaeda on their territory."

Canadian police have said there was no sign the plot had been sponsored by the Iranian state. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said al Qaeda's beliefs were in no way consistent with Tehran's.

As yet, many details of the alleged plot remain unclear. However, a U.S. government source cited a network of al Qaeda fixers based in the Iranian city of Zahedan, close to the borders of both Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The source said they served as go-betweens, travel agents and financial intermediaries for al Qaeda operatives and cells operating in Pakistan and moving through the area.

Another Western source suggested that with relations deteriorating between Iran and al Qaeda over the civil war in Syria, Tehran had acted recently to stop fighters crossing through from Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) to join Islamist militants fighting to overthrow Assad.

"Although the relationship between Iran and Al Qaeda has always been strained, this worsened after 2011 when the two sides lined up on opposite sides in the Syrian civil war," said Shashank Joshi, a researcher at the Royal United Services Institute think-tank in London.

"Syria's strongest rebel group is allied to Al Qaeda, and both have sharply criticized Iranian support for the Assad regime."

It is unclear whether the planning for the alleged Canadian plot, which Canadian police said had been in the works for some time, was carried out before Syria's war deepened the strain between Tehran and al Qaeda.

"There has been a loosening of the ties," said Barrett, noting that documents released after U.S. forces caught and killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan in 2011 showed the al Qaeda leader saying he was not able to trust the Iranians at all.

"Since then we have Zawahri castigating Iran quite recently. So clearly something had gone wrong."

IRANIAN CONTROL FAR FROM CLEAR

If indeed the al Qaeda network was based in and around Zahedan - which lies on the main road to Pakistan and is the capital of Sistan-Baluchestan province - it is far from clear how easy it would be for Iran to control.

The region is home to a toxic mix of drug smuggling, illicit trade and gun-running by insurgents. Afghan refugees long ago crowded into poor neighborhoods on the outskirts of Zahedan, although Iran, like Pakistan, periodically tries to push them out, arguing they are a security risk.

Iranian authorities have also been battling a Sunni insurgency of their own in recent years by ethnic Baloch complaining of discrimination. The Jundollah group has claimed several attacks including a bombing that killed 42 people in 2009 - there is no sign it is linked to al Qaeda, though it is often confused with a Pakistan-based group of the same name.

At the same time, on the Pakistan side of the border, Pakistani security forces are fighting an insurgency by secular Baloch separatists, while al-Qaeda linked militants in the Sunni sectarian Lashkar-e-Jhangvi group have carried out a string of attacks against the Shi'ite population there.

PRAGMATIC APPROACH

Despite a common Western misconception that Iran, as the pre-eminent Shi'ite power, is motivated by religion, it has always been much more pragmatic in pursuing its national interest, analysts and diplomats say, allowing it to turn a blind eye to Sunni al Qaeda using its territory.

"The thing that has stymied people is that ‘al Qaeda is Sunni and the rest of the people we are talking about here are Shia. They don't mix and match.' Well, they do. And they do it whenever they want to. They just look the other way," said Nick Pratt, a retired U.S. Marines colonel and CIA officer now with the George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies.

Before the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, Iran cooperated with India and Russia against the Pakistan-backed Taliban then in power in Kabul. When al Qaeda members fled Afghanistan after the overthrow of the Taliban, it detained them under house arrest in Tehran.

"Since 9/11 a number of senior al Qaeda figures including one of Osama bin Laden's sons and senior commander and strategist Saif al Adel made their way to Iran," said Nigel Inkster, former director of operations for Britain's MI6.

"They were detained under quite strict conditions by the Iranian authorities who subsequently sought to use them as a bargaining chip with the US government in their ongoing dispute about Iran's nuclear program," added Inkster, who is now director of Transnational Threats and Political Risk at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

Vahid Brown, a U.S.-based researcher who has written extensively on al Qaeda, said in an article on the Jihadica website earlier this year that the men who fled to Iran constituted a dissident faction within al Qaeda, which in recent years had become increasingly vocal in their criticism of bin Laden and Zawahiri.

Divided by their views on the advisability of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, broadly speaking, "the pro-9/11 group, including bin Laden and Zawahiri, fled to Pakistan, while the anti-9/11 group ended up in Iran, where they were placed under house arrest by Iranian authorities," he wrote.

Iran had been willing to cooperate with the United States on Afghanistan initially, but relations soured after Tehran was denounced by then President George W. Bush as part of the "axis of evil" in 2002 and worsened further after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Later, analysts say, Tehran allowed al Qaeda members - among them al Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi - to transit through Iran.

But Iran has been vulnerable to al Qaeda as well. After one of its diplomats was kidnapped in Pakistan some years ago it released some of the al Qaeda members it had under house arrest in exchange for his freedom, according to Pakistani media reports.

"About 18 months ago the Iranians released most if not all of those they were holding, for reasons still not entirely clear," said Inkster.

"There may well be a residual AQ presence in Iran though I would be cautious about presenting it as something very structured or hierarchic," he added.

"AQ is far from being the organization it once was and what matters more are relationships between like-minded individuals. And that may well be what we are seeing in the Canada case. There seems to be no evidence of Iranian official involvement."

(Editing by Peter Graff)

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Assad says West will pay for backing al Qaeda in Syria

By Mariam Karouny and Dominic Evans

BEIRUT (Reuters) - President Bashar al-Assad accused the West on Wednesday of supporting al Qaeda militants in Syria's civil war and warned they would turn against their backers and strike "in the heart of Europe and the United States".

Assad also launched his strongest criticism yet of neighboring Jordan for allowing thousands of fighters to cross the border to join a conflict he insisted his forces would win and save Syria from destruction.

"We have no choice but victory. If we don't win, Syria will be finished and I don't think this is a choice for any citizen in Syria," the defiant president said in a television interview.

Assad's forces have been fighting back across the country against rebels who have taken control of much of rural Syria and seized a provincial capital in March for the first time in two years of fighting.

The conflict started with mainly peaceful demonstrations but descended into a civil war in which the United Nations says at least 70,000 people have been killed. Islamist militants have emerged as the most potent of the anti-Assad rebels.

Drawing parallels with Western support for anti-Soviet fighters in Afghanistan in the 1980s, some of whom later formed the al Qaeda organization which attacked the United States in September 2011, Assad said Washington and Europe would regret supporting rebels in Syria.

"The West paid heavily for funding al Qaeda in its early stages in Afghanistan. Today it is supporting it in Syria, Libya and other places, and will pay a heavy price later in the heart of Europe and the United States," he told al-Ikhbariya channel.

"The truth is, what is happening is that we are mainly facing extremist forces," Assad added.

He was speaking a week after Syria's rebel al-Nusra Front, one of the most effective rebel forces battling his troops, formally pledged allegiance to al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri.

The United States has designated the Nusra Front a terrorist organization and has sought to bolster rival rebel forces to counter the influence of the Islamists, training fighters in neighboring Jordan and allowing arms shipments to them.

In some of his toughest comments against Jordan, Assad said Syria's southern neighbor had allowed thousands of fighters with military gear to cross into Syria to join the fight, and warned that the conflict could spread to Jordanian territory.

"The fire will not stop at our border and everybody knows that Jordan is exposed as Syria is," he said.

He said Syria had sent a security envoy to Amman in recent weeks to inquire about the fighters and reports of rebel training camps but he was met with "complete denial" of any Jordanian role in either issue.

The United States will send 200 troops to Jordan in the coming weeks to help the kingdom boost its defenses in the face of a "deteriorating situation" in Syria, Jordanian Minister of State for Information Mohammad al-Momani told Reuters.

Rebels say U.S. officers in Jordan have been training groups of anti-Assad fighters from Damascus and the southern province of Deraa - where fighting has intensified in recent weeks and rebels have made gains.

"It's not possible to believe that thousands enter Syria with their gear (from Jordan) when Jordan is able to stop or arrest a single person carrying a simple weapon for resistance in Palestine," Assad said.

(Reporting by Dominic Evans and Mariam Karouny; Editing by Jon Hemming)

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Al Qaeda adds urgency to search for Syrian peace

By Khaled Yacoub Oweis

AMMAN (Reuters) - International powers will search for a peaceful settlement to Syria's civil war with fresh urgency at an Istanbul meeting after a rebel faction aligned itself with al Qaeda, diplomats and opposition sources said on Sunday.

Saturday's meeting of 11 countries from the Friends of Syria alliance will come after the al-Nusra Front, among the strongest formations seeking to topple President Bashar al-Assad, pledged allegiance to al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri on April 10.

"We will be meeting under the shadow of the advances of Nusra and other militants. The recent al Qaeda statements have injected a new urgency for the international community to push to end the conflict," said an official who will attend the meeting on the conflict that has killed more than 70,000 people.

Western powers, which want to see the end of the Assad family's 43-year rule but do not want to intervene militarily in Syria, have been alarmed by the advance of groups like the Nusra Front in a conflict which has deepened the Middle East's sectarian divide.

Among those invited to Istanbul will be Moaz Alkhatib, a moderate cleric from Damascus, who said he was resigning as head of the Syrian National Coalition in March after other members of the main opposition group attacked his proposal for negotiating with Assad, the sources said.

Envoys representing most of the 11 Friends of Syria countries met in Cairo this month to press Alkhatib to stay on as leader of Coalition, a 60-member opposition umbrella group backed by the West and Gulf Arab states, the sources said.

The Istanbul meeting, whose full agenda has not been finalized, will also discuss how to pressure Assad, who has been backed by Iran and Russia, into accepting a negotiated settlement, the diplomats said.

"The international powers are inclined to call Assad's bluff and see if he is ready to accept a peaceful solution," another diplomat said, adding that Russia might also favor such a move.

SECTARIAN CONFLICT

The conflict, which pits the Sunni Muslim majority against Assad's supporters among his Alawite sect, has prompted both Sunni and Shi'ite militants from elsewhere in the Middle East to fight in Syria. The Alawite sect is an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam.

The Syrian National Coalition said in a statement on Sunday that the Nusra Front's announcement "contradicts the will of the Syrian people and the objectives of the revolution". But it added that the group could not be ignored.

Sectors of the opposition want to force a U.S.- and Russian-backed settlement on both Assad and hardline groups like the Nusra Front, but Russia has first to be won over, a senior opposition source said.

"There is a growing realization that a peaceful settlement has to be imposed on Assad and on the jihadists," the opposition source said.

In February, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem said in Moscow that Assad's government was ready for talks with rebels. But fighting intensified and rebels made gains particularly in Syria's east, which accounts for all the country's oil output and most of its grains production.

The Istanbul meeting will be attended by representatives from Turkey, Egypt, Jordan, United Arab Emirates as well as Qatar, and Saudi Arabia - the two main Arab powers backing the two year revolt. From the West, the United States, Britain, Germany, Italy and France will attend, the sources said.

The Friends of Syria last met on February 28 in Rome.

Hardline Islamists including the Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham seized Raqqa in east Syria over the past two months. The Nusra Front also expanded its influence in the southern province of Deraa, according to opposition military sources.

Jordan's Prime Minister Abdullah Ensour told parliament on Sunday that Syrian crisis was "threatening the country's national security," adding that Jordan would appeal to the United Nations Security Council over the impact on its economy of hosting Syrian refugees.

Jordan says it has received Syrian 450,000 refugees.

At east one Lebanese man was killed on Sunday when a shell fired from Syria hit a built-up area in no man's land between the two countries, a Lebanese security source said.

Witnesses say fighting intensified in the last few days in the Qusair region along the Syrian-Lebanese border in the Bekaa Valley between Syrian Shi'ite militia backed by Assad's ally Hezbollah and Sunni rebel fighters.

(Additional reporting by Suleiman al-Khalidi Oweis, Amman newsroom; Editing by Jason Webb)

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Al Qaeda in Africa says beheads French hostage: agency

NOUAKCHOTT (Reuters) - Al Qaeda's North African arm said it had beheaded a French hostage in retaliation for France's intervention in Mali, Mauritania's ANI news agency reported on Tuesday, citing a commander for the group.

In what ANI reported was a telephone call to the agency, which has close links to Islamist militants, the commander said Philippe Verdon had been beheaded on March 10 "in response to the French military intervention in the north of Mali", ANI reported.

Verdon was one of two French hostages kidnapped in the northern Mali town of Hombori in November 2011. The French foreign ministry declined to comment.

Another 14 French hostages are detained in Western African, including seven believed to be held in the Sahel by Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and its affiliates.

One of AQIM's leaders, Mokhtar Belmokhtar, had pledged revenge after France launched a campaign in January to dislodge the group and other Islamist militants who had hijacked a Tuareg rebellion in the Sahel nation and seized the northern half of the country.

After driving them from the main cities of Gao, Timbuktu and Kidal in a swift, nine-week assault, some 1,600 French and Chadian troops began searching for Islamist rebels in their pocket hideouts in the mountainous region of northern Mali.

The AQIM commander described Verdon as a French spy. He said that French President Francois Hollande "bore the responsibility for the remaining hostages".

When asked by the agency whether Belmokhtar had been killed, he neither denied nor confirmed it. There have been conflicting reports on whether Belmokhtar was killed in the French military campaign against the rebels.

(Reporting by Laurent Prieur and John Irish; Writing by Bate Felix; Editing by Michael Roddy)

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France says al Qaeda chief Abou Zeid "probably" killed

PARIS (Reuters) - Al Qaeda's senior field commander in the Sahara, Abdelhamid Abou Zeid, has probably been killed in Mali, the head of France's joint chiefs of staff said on Monday.

Edouard Guillaud's remarks are the first indication from the French government that Abou Zeid died in fighting in the rugged north of Mali.

Asked on Europe 1 radio whether he had been killed, Guillaud said: "It is probable but only probable. We don't have any certainty for the moment (but) it would be good news."

Chad's army, which is fighting alongside French forces in northern Mali, said last week that it killed Abou Zeid and another al Qaeda commander in the area, Mokhtar Belmokhtar.

(Reporting by Leigh Thomas; Editing by Pravin Char)

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