Emmanuel Macron has said that French military forces have killed the leader of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara, Adnan Abu Walid al-Sahrawi.
“It is another important success in our fight against terrorist groups in the Sahel,” the French president said dit Wednesday night, without revealing the location of the operation.
The Sahrawi was the historic leader of the Islamic State in the Sahel region in West Africa and his group led U.S. soldiers in a deadly attack in Niger in 2017, Macron’s office said.
In August 2020, Sahrawis personally ordered the killing of six French charity workers and their Nigerian driver, he added.
Macron said in July that France would soon begin reforming its force in the Sahel, where it has been at the forefront of the fight against Islamist militants, and would eventually halve its military presence.
Without an apparent end in view of France’s operations and political turmoil, especially in Mali, Paris had been frustrated.
“The nation is thinking this evening of all its heroes who died for France in the Sahel in the Serval and Barkhane operations, of the grieving families, of all their wounded,” Macron said in a tweet. “His sacrifice is not in vain. With our African, European and American partners, we will continue this struggle. “