Moktar Belmoktar Is Leader Of A Militant Group Who Took 41 Foreigners Hostage In Sahara Desert

This image from video provided by the SITE Intel Group made available Thursday Jan. 17, 2013, purports to show militant militia leader Moktar Belmoktar. Algerian officials scrambled Thursday Jan. 17, 2013 for a way to end an armed standoff deep in the Sahara desert with Islamic militants who have taken dozens of foreigners hostage, turning to tribal Algerian Tuareg leaders for talks and contemplating an international force. The group claiming responsibility called Katibat Moulathamine or the Masked Brigade says it has captured 41 foreigners, including seven Americans, in the surprise attack Wednesday on the Ain Amenas gas plant. Algerian Interior Minister Daho Ould Kabila said the roughly 20 well armed gunmen were from Algeria itself, operating under orders from Moktar Belmoktar, al-Qaida’s strongman in the Sahara. <AP Photo/SITE Intel Group>

JGC Corporation, or Nikki Manager of public relations Takeshi Endo, center, arrives for a press conference following Wednesday’s attack at a natural gas complex in Algeria which involves the company’s workers, at its headquarters in Yokohama, near Tokyo Thursday, Jan. 17, 2013. <AP Photo/Kyodo News>

Statoil’s director of foreign operations, right, Lars Christian Bacher, CEO of Statoil Helge Lund, centre and leader of Secretariat Bjorn Otto Sverdrup speak at a press conference about the hostage situation in Algeria, in Stravanger, Norway, Thursday, Jan. 17, 2013.. Algerian forces launched a military assault Thursday at a natural gas plant in the Sahara Desert, trying to free dozens of foreign hostages held by militants who have ties to Mali’s rebel Islamists, diplomats and an Algerian security official said. Yet information on the Algerian operation varied wildly and the conflicting reports that emerged from the remote area were impossible to verify independently <AP Photo/Kent Skibstad/NTB Scanpix>

A man reads a newspaper headlining “Terrorist attack and kidnapping in In Amenas”, at a news stand in Algiers, Thursday, Jan. 17, 2013. Algerian forces raided a remote Sahara gas plant on Thursday in an attempt to free dozens of foreign hostages held by militants with ties to Mali’s rebel Islamists, diplomats and an Algerian security official said. Information on the Algerian assault in the remote area was wildly varying _ Islamic militants claimed that 35 hostages and 15 militants died in a strafing by Algerian helicopters, while Algeria’s official news service claimed hundreds of local workers and half the foreigners were rescued. <AP Photo/Ouahab Hebbat>