France 'at war' with Al Qaida over hostage execution

Paris: France is "at war" with Al Qaida and will step up efforts to fight its North African offshoot after it executed a French hostage in the Sahara, Prime Minister Francois Fillon has said.

Fillon acknowledged that the group may have killed 78-year-old hostage Michel Germaneau before — not after — a failed last-ditch raid to try to free him.

Al Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb said in an audio message broadcast on Sunday that it had killed Germaneau in retaliation for a raid last week by Mauritanian and French forces that killed at least six Al Qaida militants.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy confirmed the killing on Monday, vowing that the perpetrators "will not go unpunished".

His prime minister said yesterday that France will reinforce efforts to work with governments in northwest Africa fighting Al Qaida in the sparsely populated swath of desert that includes the borders dividing Mauritania, Mali, Algeria and Niger.

"We are at war against Al Qaida," Fillon said on Europe-1 radio. He said France "thwarts several attacks every year", without elaborating.

Combat risks

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner said yesterday from Mauritania that the Sahel region in question "will not be left to terrorist bands, arms and drug traffickers".

"The combat risks being long but we will continue it," Kouchner said after meeting with Mauritanian President Mohammad Ould Abdul Aziz. Sarkozy sent the minister to the region this week to discuss, among other things, security for French citizens.

Fillon said it was unclear when Germaneau was killed. He said French authorities considered the possibility that the hostage "had already been dead" at the time of a July 12 ultimatum issued by the terrorist group.