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Al-Qaeda vows to fight on
20/06/2004 10:05 - (SA)
Dubai - Al-Qaeda confirmed on Sunday the death of its leader in Saudi Arabia, Abdul Aziz al-Muqrin, but said that he had a successor and that its war against both the Saudi rulers and the United States would continue.
In a statement released on Sunday on an Islamist internet site, the group said: "Fighting commander Abdul Aziz bin Issa al-Muqrin fell as a martyr on Friday ... in an ambush laid for him by the soldiers of tyranny in the Malaz district of Riyadh," said the statement signed by "al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula".
The text, published on a website that regularly publishes statements from the al-Qaeda Islamic extremist network, also said that Muqrin had prepared for his succession at the head of the group.
The Saudi authorities announced on Saturday that they had killed Muqrin shortly after his group had decapitated a US national they had taken hostage in Riyadh.
"The soldiers suddenly opened fire on the combatants with light weapons, killing them. May God bless them," the statement continued.
It added that Muqrin had died "after having prepared sincere men from among the combatants to succeed him and carry on the jihad, equipped by God with everything needed to bring harm to America and its agents among the tyrants.
"They have committed themselves to apply sharia (Islamic) law and to avenge the blood of Muslims and combatants," the statement continued.
It also said that the death of Moqrin "will only strengthen the combatants in their determination on the path of jihad," or holy war.
The al-Qaeda statement was published on the web at http://www.koolpages.com/sout19/index.htm.
The authors of the statement further denied that they had produced another document, published on Saturday and which denied that Moqrin had been killed.
The earlier statement "was unfounded," the group said.
- AFP
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