Al Qaeda commander Mokhtar Belmokhtar may be `alive’

London: Algerian al Qaeda commander Mokhtar Belmokhtar, reported killed by Chadian troops, may be alive, a monitoring service has claimed.

The US-based SITE service reported that an unidentified participant in militant website discussions said in a message posted on several forums that Belmoktar was ‘alive and well and leading the battles himself’. The message said Belmokhtar, the presumed mastermind behind a hostage-taking at an Algerian gas plant in January, would soon issue a message confirming the news, SITE reported. The report said that the online participant, however, did not indicate how he learned of Belmoktar`s status. According to the Telegraph, the death of Belmokhtar, nicknamed ``the uncatchable``, has been reported several times in the past. On Saturday, Chad said its forces had killed him in the same part of Mali that they had killed Adelhamid Abou Zeid, al Qaeda`s other senior field commander in the Sahara, a few days previously. ANI