December 20 - More kidnappings in Mauritania - closed or difficult borders - trans-Sahara drug trade
More bad news from Mauritania - an elderly Italian, his Burkinabe wife and an Ivorian driver were reported kidnapped from their shot-out minibus very close to the Malian border on Friday night. A Reuters report here, location here, discussion with doubtless links to more recent reports starts here.
Like the kidnap of the Spanish and the Frenchman in Mali earlier, the raid took place at night - and this latest event took place on the track or road from Ayoun to Nioro and Bamako in Mali - in other words a main route not out in the desert.
In the meantime AQIM have released a statement claiming they are holding the 3 Spanish and the Frenchman abducted in November somewhere in Mali, as expected.
Other news - also bad - it's said the Malian border with Algeria at Tessalit is closed to tourists (not that anyone would go there at this time) while at Assamaka they're trying to pull a scam and make you pay 100s of euros for an unnecessary escort to Arlit - though this could be just down to one individual and a flash in the pan.
Lately more news agencies are carrying reports about cocaine shipped from South America being transported across the Sahara to Europe, under protection from AQIM. A discussion in this subject here.
November 30 - 3 Spanish kidnapped from a moving car in Mauritania
Three Spanish aid volunteers working for Barcelona-Acció Solidaria were grabbed from their vehicle yesterday (the last in a convoy of around 13) while driving down the main desert highway from Nouadhibou at a point inland and northeast from Nouamghar, around 170km north of Nouakchott. The village of Chelkhett Legtouta is mentioned, but it doesn't appear on any map and may be a new settlement following the construction of this desert highway a few years ago.
An early news report here, a translation of another Spanish newspaper report here, and a discussion with links to many more recent reports here.
November 28 - Frenchman kidnapped in Mali
The first kidnapping of the season, a French malaria researcher grabbed in Menaka, eastern Mali (close to where Edwin Dyer and group were taken earlier this year). More news here.
November 8 - News
By the time you read this I'll have converted the stripped down GPS waypoints on the Morocco Overland - Routes page more useful .gpx files.
Looks like the next Simoon crater tour is happening in early Jan - as a way of working off Xmas excess on the 200-km trek to the Amguid Crater. it's recommended by the BMC.
Travel news: it seems the Algerian military is pushing hard at (or getting lucky with) AQIM, if recent reports are to be believed. Events include the wounding of Abdel Hamid Abou Zeid near Adrar last week - the guy who is said to have executed Brit hostage Edwin Dyer in Mali earlier this year. Whether he was actually caught is not clear. As a result the Algeria page has been updated and my 4x4 February tour cancelled.
Mauritania is currently not issuing even 3-day visas at the Western Sahara border this has been the case on and off for the last year or so so, as always it's best to get it in advance at Rabat. Details here
July 14 - Final hostage released in Mali - Algeria-Niger - Morocco Overland in stock
As the Malian army sends out operations against AQIM camps in the north of the county, news comes through that the last hostage, Swiss Werner Greiner was released on Sunday in Gao, most probably for the usually denied ransom. More here.
It is said that the Niger border with Algeria at Assamaka is closed, possibly as a result of the President of Niger's recent actions.
Following over-optimistic delivery estimates, Morocco Overland is now finally available at Matt's and ought to be in the bookshops in a week or two. The 'Routes' section of the Morocco Overland website is now fully functional.
For those who pre-ordered, thanks for your patience.
June 20 - Libya turns the screws again
For the latest visa regs, click this.
June 6 - British hostage killed in Mali
An Austrian-based Brit, Edwin Dyer (left) who was kidnapped with 2 Swiss and a German in January 2009 while on a German organised tour in eastern Mali, was killed last Friday by his AQIM captors when a second deadline for ransom demands ended. These demands included the release of Abu Qatada, a radical Muslim cleric held in a UK prison for extradition to Jordan and described as an associate of Osama bin Laden, as well as up to 10 million euros.
Although other hostages have died in captivity and tourists have very occasionally been killed in the Sahara, Edwin Dyer is the first tourist hostage to actually be executed when a deadline expired. It is thought the fact that he was British was significant in his murder. The two women in the group were released in April along with the 2 Canadian diplomats grabbed in Niger in November 2008 (9/09: interview with Robert Fowler here). It is thought ransoms were paid by their governments although this is always denied in these cases. A Swiss man Werner Greiner, whose wife was among the two women released earlier, remains in captivity.
If you can stomach it, there is a 250-page monograph dating from June 2008 published by the Institute for Security Studies, titled: 'Terrorism, in the Maghreb' available here.
News links, comment and recent developments here.
May 27 - Ceasefire in Niger - Mauritania
Things could be looking up in northeastern Niger with a ceasefire announced between the MNJ and FPN and the Niger government. It was a few days as it happens, after a foundation stone was laid at a new uranium mine site at Imouraren, just south of Arlit by French company Areva. Niger supplies most of France's uranium and Areva says it expects Imouraren to become Africa's biggest uranium mine. One of the MNJ's claims was to receive a greater share of uranium royalties mined in northeastern Niger.
Then again, a few days after this, president Mamadou Tandja (70) dissolved parliament after the courts rejected his plan to hold a referendum to gain an unconstitutional third five-year term.
Mauritania has again temporarily stopped issuing visas at the Moroccan border until the June elections have been completed.
March 20 - New map for Morocco
After six years there's a new edition of the 1:1m, double-sided on plastic paper. Full review here.
February 20 - Oh Lord! - two Mercedes desert travelogues reviewed.
My Mercedes is Not for Sale and Tom Sheppard's testament to 40-odd years of desert travels: Quiet for a Tuesday.
There's a new Lonely Planet out for Morocco too. For a forensic comparison with it and the current Rough Guide, click this.
February 11 - Adios Amilcar!
Other news, the Amilcar Hotel, that stalwart 
disco-dancing 70s cheapie with great parking and crap food is closed. Wasting a prime spot of beachfront in Tunis' upmarket Sidi Bou Said suburb, even the east European tour groups, lovelorn local couples and bar room brawlers who patronised the place could not keep it going - I suspect. Don't know anything else out of the city centre so cheap, secure and handy for La Goulette port. Hammamet resort 40 clicks down the motorway would be my next choice if on the way to Algeria or Libya.
And still more good news: along with the obscure Erg Chech region, the Tanezrouft route from Reganne down to Bordj Moktar (BBM) on the Mali border is open again. It was unclear why it was closed to tourists a year or so ago when BBM could be accessed from Tam in the east.
January 28 - Back from Algeria. Kidnapping in Mali
Recently back from taking the first Simoon group to the Amguid crater in Algeria. Picture report here. It's a tough walk on some hot days but I found a better way to the crater that was actually one of the easier ones (the Aguelmam Rahla option mentioned below was too tricky to guarantee). The crater is a highlight of course, but so it the next-, last day when we walk out of the canyon, over the plateau to finish off with a walk through the Bou Zerafa dune field (left).
Same time, same place, same me with Simoon next year. A great way to work off Christmas.
I'm also planning some of my own tours in Algeria for 2010. Things are looking up there at the moment. More news here when the quotes come back.
Other news from Algeria here.
Elsewhere, 3 tourists were kidnapped in eastern Mali close to the Niger border where they attended a Tuareg music festival and where a Candian diplomat also went missing a few weeks ago. This Sahelian border region has long been thought to be a risky area and is not on regular tourist routes. Some links here.
December 21 - Bike report and Mali attack
A report on how my Tenere performed in Morocco here and a news of a Tuareg raid on an army base in Mali here. You do sometimes wonder if the words 'rebel' and even 'Tuareg' are rather carelessly used...
December 14 - Interesting political blog on the Maghreb.
Came across this blog here whose author is notable in holding back from the more lipsmacking regional conspiracy theories with more pragmatic explanations, especially when it comes to jihadism and smuggling. It has similarly well-informed links in all directions such as this which could all distract you for hours and reminds you just how complex the region's politics are and more significantly how the mainstream media - whose reports are often parroted here for want of time and dedication - skims over these deeper issues or just gets them wrong. And also how crazy you'd have to be to go out there on a holiday!
Inside a dust storm
Not so hard to do of course, but this slideshow from near Tindouf shows the drama of the airborne 'tsunami' and may have been related to the extreme weather Morocco experienced in October.
December 8 - new Libyan visa regs and 'Wanjina' style rock art in Akakus/Tassili?
Libya's moved the goalposts yet again - now you need to be in a group of 5 to get a tourist visa (some dodge said to stop business men sneaking in on tourist visas). Agencies are trying to get round it by grouping various parties together into the required numbers to help obtain a visa. Easily done as the 5 don't have to leave and arrive by the same means and the same time, one is told.
I'm not sure if it's some sort of hoax, but on this Libyan tour operator's web page 
there's picture of a painting (below left), originally claimed to be from the Akakus, but now changed to the adjacent Tassili in Algeria. It bears a striking resemblance to the mysterious 'Wanjina' figures of northwestern Australia. Now modified, their caption originally said:
One of the most unusal prehistoric paintings found in the Acacus area; so ancient and yet modern in both: style and subject. A hole in the chest and the eyes connected with a curved line!
Unlike the ancient rock art of the Sahara, where stylistic links can be detected from the Gilf to the Tanezrouft, Australian rock art takes many distinctive regional forms and styles (and it's worth remembering was, until very recently, a living element of the world's longest surviving culture).
Wanjina figures (see Google Images for several examples, ancient and modern) are a favourite among Von Daniken-esque 'alien astronaut visitation' theorists, and as far as I know are only found in the remote Kimberley region of northern WA. Originally painted on rock shelters (my picture bottom right), figures are depicted on canvas by some contemporary Aboriginal artists like Lily Karadada (below centre) and as google Images show, right across Australia on T-shirts, posters and so on.
Prehistoric rock art does share broad similarities all over the world of course - try this link of carefully selected images but note the unsubliminal message in the last picture! The Saharan image might be said to have a very faint resemblance to the well-known and - to some - astronautical 'Martian god' figure (above right) found in the Tassili in the 1950s or 60s by Lhote (I believe). But to me the it's far more similar to the owl-eyed, mouthless Wanjina figures of the Kimberley. I wonder if it's for real.
November 28 - Austrian hostages freed
The two Austrians kidnapped in Tunisia last February by Al-Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb were released from captivity in northern Mali in late October following the payment of a ransom of around 4m euros - denied by Austria as it was by Germany in 2003, and possibly put up by Libya's President Gaddafi. One hears that psychologically and physically they had a tough time in the hands of their abductors but are recovering well. The exact location of the abduction in Tunisia is not being disclosed, nor will anything be allowed to emerge about their magically undetected transit across the length of Algeria.
Other information that came out in an interview was that the abductors were disappointed to have kidnapped Austrians and had they been Americans, British or even Danish (the Danes I'm advised, on account of the notorious cartoons) they would have been killed immediately, while French nationals may have been spared and ransomed. The abductors were also disappointed not to be able to have grabbed more tourists in Tunisia, suggesting a similar plan to the mass abductions in Algeria in 2003. The Algerian media reported that the kidnappers were assisted by people in Tunisia to help locate their targets. This seems a fairly lame way of implying "it wasn't [just] us!" (many such traps depend on local look outs with sat phones) but Al-Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb are based in northeastern Algeria. For a not so well Googled translation of a newspaper interview click this.
It is also said that some Tuareg groups in northern Mali were strongly supporting the efforts to release the two Austrians. Since the abductions Tunisia has put restrictions on travel in the south. More details here.
Morocco 
on the Tenere; the plan of course went down the pan but job done in perfect November weather after the rains which wracked the country in September and October. In the east the big oueds Ziz and Rheris where running faster than I wanted to risk it alone, out past the dunes of Merzouga (right) blocking off Route M6 at Remilia and a lot of bridges were out across the Rekkam plateau (left). The west - Anti Atlas - was less affected so I spent some time there.
Along with the map reviews (see below) I've kicked off a list of recommended accommodation in southern Morocco on the forum.
October 25 - Morocco
Off to Morocco on, of all things, a motor bike for the first time since I don't know when. I've lined myself up with a packed itinerary from Missour in the east to Smara in the south, but chances are it will all fall apart once the flooding and damage from the recent storms becomes evident. Either way it'll be fun looking for rideable routes.
I've put together a detailed review of what I consider to be the best range of mapping for travelling the pistes in the Atlas and the Moroccan Sahara.
Elsewhere, the Gilf is open again for permits as is the south of Libya following the release of the kidnappers.
Sept 30 - Gilf hostages freed
Been away for a month during which time the 11 European tourists and 8 Egyptian crew who were abducted near Jebel Uweinat about week ago (probably by Sudanese bandits affiliated to those who stole tourist cars in the area in January) were freed yesterday following an operation by Egyptian special forces in the Sudan-Chad border area. Half the bandits were killed, some fled and the €6m ransom was not paid. Discussion here.
In the meantime, even with the escort rules Libya temporarily imposed restrictions in the south and a dozen troops were abducted near Zouerat in northern Mauritania by AQ-M and found dead a few days later.
Still no news of the two Austrians held in Mali/Niger since February other than Mali holds the Austrian got ransom money.
August 25 - News
Today a big bomb east of Algiers killed dozens, a ceasefire was announced in Niger by the Tuareg rebels in a deal brokered by Libya and which may include north Mali, but was then retracted. No significant news for weeks about the two Austrians abducted in Tunisia six months ago and thought to be held in northern Mali.
June 25 - Tunisia
Tunisia has now introduced
restrictions to independent travel in it's southern areas
following the still unresolved kidnapping in February.
Details here.
May 20 - It's only Morocco
Just back from Morocco recce-ing routes for a banger rally and checking over my Sahara Overland routes - updates here. My trip report here or here
As always, saw many interesting things: first snake
in the Sahara - as big as my arm near Bou Jerif, lost villages
in hidden canyons not on any map, first real sand storm
since 1984 - the whole 'Wall of Sand' experience with zero
viz. Transit vans and Golfs crawling over passes that ought
to eat them for breakfast; some guys overlanding on quads...
and plenty more. Weather seemed all over the place; 40°C
sand winds out of Foum Zguid for days while some bikers
told me of snow over the Rif around the same time.
April 14 - Austrian hostage update
The latest kidnappers' deadline passed without significant event, although recent Malian army attacks on Tuareg rebel positions in the area ( though not thought to be connected with the kidnappings) brings suggestions that the hostages may have now been moved to northern Mauritania.
April 2 -
Attacks in the Algerian Sahara - more demands from AQ-M kidnappers
Smugglers or terrorists? who knows: news here. The location, Rourd Enous, is a gas field in the Gassi Touil, about 70km north of Hassi bel Guebbour.
The kidnappers of the Austrians are also reported to have increased their demands.
March 25 - More bombs in Algeria - Malian convoy ambushed in the Iforghas - hostage deadline extended
News here, with links to related stories about the kidnapped Austrians whose captors have extended their deadline until April 6th. (8 Apr: the deadline passed with just another threatening communiqué from AQIM)
A raid on a military convoy by Tuareg militants was reported last Thursday at Aleibara in which 20 soldiers were taken hostage and as many as eight vehicles captured. Yet no one seems to have made the connection that Aleibara is exactly the location given for the hostages in a map (below) produced a few days earlier - surely no coincidence. If both locations are correct was the convoy a rescue operation that went wrong? Were the 'Tuareg' raiders actually entrenched AQIM mudjahadeen defending the camp but labeled, deliberately or otherwise, as 'Tuareg rebels', or are the Tuareg rebels now supporting the AQIM operation - unlikely.
Among other exaggerations and assumptions, the latest in a series of doom-laden analyses from 'counter terrorism experts' like this repeat the old myth that the Adrar des Ifoghas is some kind of modern-day Tora Bora: "... a great hiding location from U.S. satellites since it is very mountainous and full of caves". This was an idea put out in the early days of Pan Sahel Initiative (see p364 in the book) probably to help justify that operation. In fact Wikipedia's less sinister description taken out of a Bradt guide book is correct, if not quite so sensational.
Meanwhile a BBC update on the situation on March 28 does not say anything new other than, by way of explaining the 2000-km transit across Algeria from Tunisia to north Mali: "... it was possible that regional governments had facilitated the transfer of the hostages to neutral ground ".
March 15 - Two Austrians abducted in Tunisia
Five years almost to the day following the abductions of 32 tourists in the Algerian Sahara in 2003, news has come through that two Austrian tourists declared missing in a Landrover in southern Tunisia since mid-February have indeed been abducted by Al Qaeda of the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). Originally thought to have strayed over the Algerian border and been held by the police (an unlikely scenario), it is now thought a unit of over a dozen AQIM mudjahadeen abducted them while exploring in the Grand Erg of southern Tunisia, probably while close to the Algerian border.
Chilling pictures have been released as threats were made by the kidnappers to kill the hostages unless AQIM prisoners in Algeria and Tunisia are released by midnight Sunday 16th and a ransom was paid. The images show the mudj lounging around the captured Land Rover still in the Grand Erg. Later, another location looks like southern Algeria 
or northern Mali (confirmed 19/3 as Aleibara- click map on the right) where half the 2003 abductees ended up until ransomed. The couple, Andrea Kloiber and Wolfgang Ebner (her face obscured) are shown surrounded by armed, khaki-clad mudjahadeen.
The statement also warned Western tourists not to visit Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria and Mauritania (where a French family was shot to death in December by AQIM) and also warned against rescue attempts on the Austrians which further suggests their Malian location is now no secret.
More news, comment and speculation here.
Thanks to various contributors for finding pictures
March 3 - Trans-Sahara smuggling
Interesting report on smuggling in the Sahara which may partly explain why security gets worse and tourist access ever more restricted.
February 11 - Algeria and Chad
Another deadly ambush on police in northeast Algeria about 50km north of El Oued town. This area around Tebessa along the Tunisian border has long been dangerous. A few days later the inevitably highly successful retaliation is detailed here.
In Chad last week's rebel invasion on N'Djamena seems to have run it's course (the story is on Wikipedia already!) once the government 'received support' from the French forces based there. It's said 300 vehicles were involved in the raid led by a former government minister with - it's suggested - support from Sudan. One wonders if the 3 vehicles stolen in the Gilf a few days earlier (see below) may have been taken for this purpose.
(thanks to Prof. Nimbus for these updates)
February 9 - Found: the Ancient Land of Yam and other discoveries
The BBC reported a diplomatic incident when it became clear that UN officers were defacing rock art sites at Lajuad in Polisario-controlled Western Sahara. As has happened before some individuals were so taken by immortalizing themselves that they virtually depicted their name rank and serial number across the 6000-year-old sites. Normally blamed on that wretched cabal known internationally as 'tourists', I suggested such an origin for this vandalism when Sahara 2 came out in 2004 (see the picture on p.400) - now there is proof.
Meanwhile in Libya a team of leading British academics team including my Desert Driving co-presenter Toby Savage unearthed what is thought to be an intact Garamantean mummy near Germa where they've been excavating for years.
And far out in the Libyan Desert Mark Borda (who attended my 2006 Eclipse tour) and Mahmoud Marei (with whom we travelled in the Gilf in 2004) discovered "engravings on a large rock consisting of hieroglyphic writing, Pharaonic cartouche, an image of the king and other Pharaonic iconography". The site is thought to be several hundred kilometres further west than the previously agreed location of such imagery at Abu Ballas (see p.622). Translation of the hieroglyphs revealed references to the hitherto legendary Land of Yam.
Of course it's discovery does not mean that Tutankhamen necessarily took his skiing holidays on Jebel Uweinat any more than graffiti claiming "Petar from Croatia rocks!" proves the Croats had an early colony south of the Hammada du Draa. But it does greatly extend what is thought to be the range of Ancient Egyptian influence across what is now the Libyan Desert.
This is something which the Swiss Carlo Bergman (see previous page ref) has been suggesting for years with his Water Mountain discovery out of Dakhla (Borda travelled with Bergman a year ago) along with the realisation that an item of Tutankhamen's funerary jewelry included a piece of Libya Desert Glass which is only found north of the Gilf, hundreds of miles from established pharaonic sites.
One hopes that with their chance to rewrite history Marco and Mahmoud won't fall out as Foggini and Colonel Mets did over the New Cave nearby (see p.634) a few years ago. All is said to be revealed to journalists and scientists this month, but if the presumed location is where many think it is, the events below may make it bother risky as well as politically complicated.
February 4 - Hijack in the Gilf
and other bad news
Not much good news to report
this week: the Israeli
embassy got attacked in
Nouakchott which suggests the murder of the French
family in December was not a merely to give
the Dakar Rally threat some clout. There was another
bomb in Algiers, Nigeran rebels vowed to attack
the mines at Arlit and Ndjamena looks
like it's been over-run by rebels thought to be
backed by Sudan. On the bright side Libya has managed
to pass the days without issuing a new restriction
on tourism but today I hear that 3
tourist vehicles
were stolen at
Eight Bells on the eastern edge of the Gilf Kebir
plateau in Egypt by over a dozen well-armed 'paramilitary'
bandits in two pickups mounted
with machine guns and assumed to be from Sudan
or Chad. One car (they local driver/guide's?) was
left.
This is the first such recorded
attack in an extremely remote region where one
usually sees no one for weeks. An official permit
was present but the mandatory accompanying soldier needed
to travel in the Gilf was not (for all the good it would have done). Recently I have heard of local operators
offering such semi-official visits into the Gilf,
probably because doing so officially takes so
long, people want to go there and the chances of
getting found out are slim. More speculation here which also now includes a report from one of the individuals (a Brit) involved.
