Mokhtar Belmokhtar

Common card · No. 407206

Mokhtar Belmokhtar (; Arabic: مختار بلمختار; 1 June 1972 – November 2016), also known as Khalid Abu al-Abbas, the One-Eyed, Nelson, Mr. Marlboro and the Uncatchable, was an Algerian leader of the group Al-Murabitoun, former military commander of Al-Qaeda in the Maghreb, smuggler and weapons dealer. He was twice convicted and sentenced to death in absentia under separate charges in Algerian courts: in 2007 for terrorism and in 2008 for murder. In 2004, he was sentenced to life imprisonment in Algeria for terrorist activities. Born in northern Algeria, Belmokhtar traveled to Afghanistan in 1991 to fight with the mujahadeen against the pro-Soviet government following the withdrawal of Soviet Union troops. There, he lost his left eye while mishandling explosives. He later joined the Islamist GIA fighting in the Algerian Civil War and following that became a commander in the Mali-based Islamist Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). In December 2012, Belmokhtar announced he was leaving AQIM...

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