Perilous Times
27 October 2010 Last updated at 09:23 ET
'Bin Laden' in warning to France after kidnap in Niger
Osama Bin Laden has reportedly tied the kidnapping of five French
people in Niger to France's treatment of its Muslim minority.
BBC - An audio message said to have been recorded by the al-Qaeda
leader says the abduction was retaliation for "France's injustice to
Muslims".
It says forthcoming French curbs on the full veil are "colonial
oppression".
The speaker identified as Bin Laden also tells France to withdraw its
troops from Afghanistan.
Bin Laden, mastermind of the 9/11 terror attacks on the US and other
atrocities, is America's most wanted man.
Believed by some to have been killed years ago, he is said by others to
be still alive, living in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region.
'Free women'
Five French citizens and two others were abducted by al-Qaeda militants
at a uranium mine in Niger last month.
It is thought they are now being held in the north-west of neighbouring
Mali.
Officials in Mali and Niger recently told France's AFP news agency they
believed the captives were still alive.
The speaker on the recording, broadcast by Qatar-based satellite TV
channel al-Jazeera, says the kidnapping was "in retaliation for
[France's] tyranny... against [the] Muslim nation".
France, he says, believes it has "the right to prevent free women from
wearing the hijab".
To protect its security, the speaker goes on, France must "withdraw
from the damned war of [former US President George W] Bush in
Afghanistan".