Criminals seeking Al-Quaeda support?

Many times terrorists have been called criminals, but to a lesser extent have they actually performed criminal acts that would fall within most of the worlds idea of a domestic profit incentive crime. Probably the most visible criminal acts of the terrorist groups would be opium production and distribution and money laundering.

The Sahara wing of Al-Quaeda seems to be trying to also cut done on it being called criminal and begin to be a true Jihad fighting group. The Sahara group has been since 2000 kidnapping foreigners and releasing them for ransom, similarly to the Somalian pirates. The possible lack of support from Al-Quaeda perhaps has prone them to execute some of those kidnap. The group has released a statement in which it it claims it has executed a kidnapped Briton. In the last year the group has also launched some attacks in Algeria killing a number of policemen.

It almost seems that a criminal group which most likely is keeping most of the ransom money for itself has lost some of its support from the real Al-Quaeda since the attack in 2008 and this was another proof of their commitment to the cause.

Per Reuters.com