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Death of Ayman al-Zawahiri, leader of al-Qaeda: "For Joe Biden, it's a success"

US President Joe Biden during the announcement of the death of al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri by a US drone strike.

© Jim Watson/Pool via REUTERS

Text by: Catherine Potet

3 mins

Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri is dead.

He was killed by an American drone strike on Kabul, Afghanistan.

He was one of the most wanted terrorists in the world.

He was considered the mastermind of the attacks of September 11, 2001 and he had succeeded Osama Bin Laden, himself killed by the Americans, in Pakistan, in 2011. Interview with Jean-Luc Racine, researcher emeritus at the CNRS and senior researcher at Asia Center.

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RFI: The leader of al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri, was therefore considered to be the mastermind of the September 11 attacks and he was involved in many other attacks.

It is not for nothing that he was one of the most wanted terrorists in the world.

Jean-Luc Racine

Yes, of course.

He was a key man who became involved in Islamic militancy at a very young age in his Egyptian land, where he had been in prison in connection with

[Egyptian president in 1981 editor's note].

And then, after his release, he finally ended up in Afghanistan where he became sort of Osama bin Laden's right-hand man, whom he succeeded when bin Laden was eliminated by US special forces in Pakistan in 2011.

So, for Joe Biden obviously and for the American intelligence community, it's a success.

What that both means for Biden's political future in an election year remains to be seen.

But also of course for, on the one hand, the future of al-Qaeda in the Indian subcontinent, since that was the name that al-Zawahiri had given to the group after the emergence of the Islamic State from a side.

And on the other side what it obviously means for the Taliban regime when we discover that al-Zawahiri was simply in Kabul.

Exactly, what conclusions can we draw from this

Anyway, al-Qaeda has long pledged allegiance to the Emir of Afghanistan.

It started with Mullah [Mohammad] Omar and it continued with his successors, including the current Emir [Hibatullah] Akhundzada on one side;

on the other side, a fraction of the Taliban and in particular that of [Sirajuddin] Haqqani, the current interior minister, has always been very close to al-Qaeda.

At a time when contacts are underway between the United States and the Taliban on questions of Afghan funds which have remained frozen in the United States, we are going to enter a phase of tension there.

We will also have to watch how Moscow and Beijing react to this news of course.

Ayman al-Zawahiri was therefore killed more than 20 years after the September 11 attacks.

For the United States, there is no time limit to "

Oh yes.

Your remark is absolutely part of the speech of Joe Biden and his predecessors, in reality, of course.

There is no limit.

►Also read: Portrait - Who was Ayman al-Zawahiri, bin Laden's successor at the head of al-Qaeda?

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