Companies around the world, from Google to BMW and Sony,
have adopted the tradition of goading the gullible on April 1 to
show their lighter sides and steal some free publicity.

Google Inc extended a practice dating back a decade
or so in poking fun at its own ubiquity: it introduced a
database of smells, pretended that it was shutting down its
YouTube service, offered a treasure-hunting mode and old
parchment style navigation on Google Maps, and unveiled Gmail
Blue, a new version of its email service that is … blue.

In Japan, telecoms company KDDI offered a mobile
phone that was actually a bed – to save ever having to get up.
And Sony Corp went to the dogs, rather literally,
introducing a TV that only displays pictures in dog-friendly
colours and has a remote with paw-enabled buttons.

A blog at Twitter, or rather “twttr”, said users who wanted
to use vowels would have to pay $5 a month. “Trd th nw Twttr yt?
Mr tm fr mr twts!” was one of the blog’s more easily deciphered
examples.

Procter and Gamble Co’s mouthwash brand Scope offered
a new “Bacon” flavour with taglines like “For breath that
sizzles” and the appetizing “Indulge your meat tooth.”

German carmaker BMW offered British readers
excited at the impending arrival of a royal baby the P.R.A.M.
(Postnatal Royal Auto Mobile) complete with picture of a
sportily styled buggy and corgis at Windsor Castle – inquiries
to Joe.King@bmw.co.uk.

SATIRE

In the more traditional realm of news-based fun, Yahoo’s
French website led its front page with the announcement that, to
save money, President Francois Hollande would move his offices
from the Elysee Palace to one of Paris’s grittier suburbs.

Iceland Review Online reported that the country’s central
bank had solved the problem of how to value the local currency,
the krona, which was badly damaged during the financial crisis
– replace it with Africa’s CFA franc.

In Britain, the Guardian offered its leftish, liberal
readers “augmented reality” spectacles to let them “see the
world through the Guardian’s eyes at all times.”

By staring at a restaurant, cinema or retail product the
paper’s critics’ reviews would come into vision without all the
hassle of reaching for the phone, wrote the Guardian’s
anagrammatic correspondent Lois P. Farlo.

“Nesta Vowles” had a story in Britain’s Daily Mail about
owls being trained, Hogwarts-style, to deliver internal mail in
an office. It carried photographs of what it called the “Roy-owl
Mail.” The Sun mocked up a shot of Mick Jagger in a tent and
said the millionaire Rolling Stones were practising for the
Glastonbury rock festival by spending Easter outdoors.

But few papers may top the Times Daily of Florence, Alabama,
which fronted Monday’s edition with a picture of a local bridge
coming under simultaneous attack by the Loch Ness Monster, a UFO
and Godzilla.

“Panic unnecessary: No deadly tomatoes reported near scene,”
the paper reported.

COULD BE TRUE?

It took French post office, La Poste, to highlight the
struggle for survival faced by traditional media in a new
technological age; it issued a press release announcing that
airborne drones were delivering newspapers to people’s homes.

Blurring the lines between mirth and marketing, Britain’s
Daily Mirror carried a story on the launch of glass-bottomed
airliners – offering special sightseeing trips over Loch Ness.
It would, it said, be operated by Richard Branson’s Virgin
airline – which duly carried its own online advert for the new
planes, along with publicity for its real new domestic service.

With April Fools Day ever more an ad man’s dream, Coca-Cola
put an ironic, postmodern twist on the whole
bluff-or-double-bluff atmosphere by advertising a relaunched
vanilla version of the fizzy drink in Britain:

The slogan? “It’s back! – (no really, it is).”

If the stress of sifting fact from fiction seemed too much,
particularly for fellow journalists writing reports from the
frontline of foolery, once could have left it to Britain’s Metro
newspaper to do the legwork and make things easier.

Its 2013 “round-up of the best jokes” from other media
included a BBC story on NASA’s Mars rover tweeting that bullying
by Internet trolls was forcing it off Twitter, the Telegraph on
rabbits bred with human ears and a supermarket press release
offering to deliver food via a 3D printer.

Trouble is, those were all made up by Metro. April Fools!

Or at least the gentle jester of the common folk has
metastised into a corporate colossus controlled by global
marketing executives, bestriding the Internet to force familiar
brands ever deeper into the collective consciousness.

So while Google extended a tradition dating back, well, a
decade or so, in poking fun at its own ubiquity – introducing a
database of smells and shutting down its YouTube service – it
was fitting that old-fashioned, paper-based media poked fun on
Monday at the power of machines over our minds.

In Britain, where newspapers have long relished the ancient
art of goading the gullible on April 1, the Guardian offered its
leftish, liberal readers “augmented reality” spectacles to let
them “see the world through the Guardian’s eyes at all times”.

By staring at a restaurant, cinema or retail product and the
paper’s critics’ reviews would come into vision without all the
hassle of reaching for the phone, wrote the Guardian’s
anagrammatic correspondent Lois P. Farlo. And “anti-bigotry
technology” would screen out offending op-ed columns should any
reader happen to pick up a copy of the right-wing Daily Mail.

Fantasy meets reality, however, with a payoff line noting
the imminent appearance in stores of Google Glass, which lets
wearers view information in front of their eyes and take video.

Google itself, which has championed the art of April Fools
Day marketing, offered visitors to its google.com search engine
a beta-version of a new technology, Google Nose – “the new
scent-sation in search”, a kind of olfactory world wide web.

In a corporation-wide push for the global funny-bone, the
company also offered gags on its Gmail email service – poking
fun at innovation with a video explaining new, Gmail Blue would
be… blue; Google Maps offered a treasure hunting mode and old
parchment style navigation; and Google’s YouTube unit “revealed”
that the video-sharing site had all along been a giant contest
and would now shut down to judge the winner.

New products and services were fair game for other brands
keen to show their lighter side: Japanese telecoms company KDDI
offered a mobile phone that was actually a bed – to save ever
having to get up; a blog at Twitter, or rather “twttr”, said
users who wanted vowels in their microblogs would have to pay.

Procter and Gamble’s mouthwash brand Scope offered a new
“Bacon” flavour – “For breath that sizzles”.

German carmaker BMW offered British readers excited at the
impending arrival of a royal baby the P.R.A.M. (Postnatal Royal
Auto Mobile) complete with picture of a sportily styled buggy
and corgis at Windsor Castle – inquiries to Joe.King@bmw.co.uk.

SATIRE

In the more traditional realm of news-based fun, Yahoo’s
French website led its front page with the announcement that, to
save money, President Francois Hollande would move his offices
from the Elysee Palace to one of Paris’s grittier suburbs.

“Nesta Vowles” had a story in Britain’s Daily Mail about
owls being trained, Hogwarts-style, to deliver internal mail in
an office. It carried photographs of what it called the “Roy-owl
Mail”. The rival Daily Express said Queen Elizabeth was renting
out rooms at Buckingham Palace – but, perhaps fearing for its
switchboard, hastened to tell readers that this was a joke.

The Sun mocked up a shot of Mick Jagger in a tent and said
the millionaire Rolling Stones were getting into practice for
playing at the Glastonbury rock festival by spending Easter out
of doors – at the Rolf Apilo campsite, of course.

In a more sharply satirical vein, the Independent took aim
at plans to control the British press by reporting that a
pro-regulation lobby group, backed by celebrity victims of media
intrusion, was being consulted by foreign governments including
Burma and Sudan on how to deal with troublesome journalists.

The Times reflected back to a gentler age with a story of
newly discovered diaries by a 19th-century army officer that
quoted “experts” comparing them to two famous historical hoaxes
- Piltdown Man’s fake “pre-human” bones and the Hitler Diaries.

Such heavy-handedness seemed an admission of defeat for a
genre whose heyday in more innocent times saw the BBC bombarded
with calls for seed catalogues after it broadcast a news item on
“spaghetti trees” in 1957; 20 years later, would-be tourists
called the Guardian for information on how to get to the idyllic
- but sadly entirely typographical – island of San Seriffe.

It took French post office, La Poste, to highlight the
struggle for survival faced by traditional media in a new
technological age; it issued a press release announcing that
airborne drones were delivering newspapers to people’s homes.

Blurring the lines between mirth and marketing, Britain’s
Daily Mirror carried a story on the launch of glass-bottomed
airliners – offering special sightseeing trips over Loch Ness.
It would, it said, be operated by Richard Branson’s Virgin
airline – which duly carried its own online advert for the new
planes, along with publicity for its real new domestic service.

With April Fools Day ever more an ad man’s dream rather than
a moment for pranks in the playground, Coca-Cola put an ironic,
postmodern twist on the whole bluff-or-double-bluff atmosphere
by advertising a relaunched vanilla version of the fizzy drink
in Britain: The slogan? “It’s back! – (no really, it is)”.

If the stress of sifting fact from fiction seemed too much,
particularly for fellow journalists writing reports from the
frontline of foolery, once could have left it to Britain’s Metro
newspaper to do the legwork and make things easier.

Its 2013 “round-up of the best jokes” from other media
included a BBC story on NASA’s Mars rover tweeting that bullying
by Internet trolls was forcing it off Twitter, the Telegraph on
rabbits bred with human ears and a supermarket press release
offering to deliver food via a 3D printer.

Trouble is, those were all made up by Metro. April Fools!

As in some other places where the Roman Catholic Church
carries little weight, 1.3 billion Chinese paid scant attention
to the Vatican; media in China focused rather on Communist party
chief Xi Jinping’s confirmation as head of state in Beijing.

Such blanket indifference was not the global norm, however.

Few of the six billion people not claimed by the Church
among its 1.2 billion followers could entirely avoid noticing
Wednesday’s elevation of Jorge Bergoglio to the papacy; TV,
radio and the web carried word from Rome to Muslims and Hindus,
Jews, Buddhists, Protestants and atheists. Reactions ran from
warmth through mild curiosity to derision and frank hostility.

“This constant advertising for this sect and its cult leader
is getting to me,” commented German Hans Reinsch on the website
of Bild newspaper, which led its front page with the pope. “I’m
going straight round to the atheists’ HQ to file a complaint!”

Leaders of other religions – muftis, rabbis, Russian and
Greek Orthodox priests and others – share a dismay at the rise
of secular faithlessness, especially in the wealthy world, and
offered cordial greetings to the first pope from a developing
country, playing down long histories of sectarian bloodshed.

But Francis had a frostier reception from those liberals in
the Western world who view his Church as an obstacle to social
reform and continue to highlight its record of covering up child
abuse by priests, a refusal to abandon its condemnation of
homosexuality and a bar on women entering the clergy.

“Always the same loser for the past 2,000 years,” ran the
caption on a cartoon in French satirical weekly Charlie-Hebdo
alongside a buxom woman in a bishop’s mitre.

“Habemus pontifex!” tweeted Ben Summerskill, chief executive
of British gay rights charity Stonewall. “Let’s hope he’s a bit
kinder to gay people than his predecessor.”

SECULAR SCEPTICS

A 76-year-old Jesuit who campaigned fiercely against gay
marriage in his native Argentina, calling it a devilish attack
on “God’s plan”, Francis seems unlikely to bring great change.

Writing in left-wing French daily Liberation, commentator
Francois Sergent asked doubtfully: “Will this old man be capable
of moving his Church and its faithful toward a greater embrace
of women, of different sexualities – or will he, like his
predecessors, remain a rigid guardian of dogma?”

Andrew Copson, chief executive of the British Humanist
Association which campaigns to keep religion out of state
policy, voiced concern at the global power of the Vatican: “One
of the main functions of the new Pope will be to amplify the
voice and influence of the Vatican on the world stage,” he said.

“If the records of his predecessors on basic rights are any
indication of the future of the role, his appointment will be of
little comfort to millions across the globe.”

In the United States, Herndon Graddick, president of gay and
lesbian group GLAAD, urged reform: “In his life, Jesus condemned
gays zero times. In Pope Benedict’s short time in the papacy, he
made a priority of condemning gay people routinely – this in
spite of the fact that the Catholic hierarchy had been in
collusion to cover up the widespread abuse of children.”

But conservative voices, including from outside the Church,
scoffed at the chances of a radical change in Vatican thinking:

“Secular liberals who were hoping the new pope would bend
the Church’s teachings to their political agenda – such as
acceptance of same-sex marriage – will no doubt be disappointed
to discover that Francis is, in fact, a Catholic,” wrote Richard
Viguerie on the U.S. website ConservativeHQ.com.

SOCIAL MEDIA GLEE

Inevitably, the billowing of white smoke from the Sistine
Chapel and the appearance of the new pontiff in papal white
robes on the balcony at St. Peter’s provided a new seam of
humour, as well as piety and abuse, across social media.

Russians tweeted an “are they related?” photo montage
playing on Francis’s passing likeness to Soviet leader Yuri
Andropov.

Another irreverent vein widely tapped by soccer fans was to
link the elevation of the Buenos Aires cardinal to the “Hand of
God” credited by his compatriot Diego Maradona for an illegal
goal against England that helped Argentina to the 1986 World
Cup.

Britain’s top-selling Sun tabloid used that line, filling
its front page with Francis, his arm raised in benediction. It
also criticised his past support for Argentina’s challenge to
British control of the Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic.

On Twitter, some took aim at the media frenzy for the story,
especially among those with little or no connection to the Roman
Catholic Church: “Omg new pope new pope!!” tweeted Ohio State
University student Laura Guthrie. “Oh wait I’m presbyterian…”

From Northern Ireland, where the Pope is a target of abuse
by hardline Protestants, a contributor called Stephen spotted
“Pope Francis” already featuring in a bit of expletive-charged
graffiti on a local bus: “At least,” he tweeted, “South
Belfast’s school kids keep up to date with current affairs.”

The wider, unbelieving world, remained more polite. While
China’s media largely ignored him, the foreign ministry in
Beijing, which severed diplomatic relations with the Vatican
after the Communist takeover of 1949, offered warmer ties:

While calling on the Pope to stop recognising Taiwan as an
independent country and rejecting his “interfering in China’s
internal affairs”, a spokeswoman for the world’s most populous
nation congratulated the new ruler of its smallest state and
said: “We are sincere in wanting to improve relations.”

(Additional reporting by Chen Aizhu in Beijing, Ellen Wulfhorst
in New York, Mary Wisniewski in Chicago, Jeremy Laurence in
Kabul and Mirna Sleiman in Dubai; Editing by Giles Elgood)

A few weeks after that visit in July 2010 to Sulmona, in the Abruzzo mountains, the then 83-year-old Benedict told a fellow German he would not hesitate to become the first pope since Celestine in 1294 to resign of his own free will, if he was no longer able – “physically, psychologically and spiritually” – to meet the demands of running the billion-strong Catholic Church.

Did the example of Celestine’s “Great Refusal” inspire his ageing successor to consider the alternative to death in office?

The working day Benedict spent in Sulmona, on July 4, 2010, was part of a typically busy schedule for the leader of one of the world’s great faiths; he met hundreds of people and said mass for the 800th birthday of Pietro Angelerio, a monk who lived in local caves before and after his five troubled months as Pope Celestine V during a conflict between Church factions.

Some of Benedict’s words that day may in retrospect betray a sense of weariness and a longing for a cloistered retirement.

In a homily to the crowd of 10,000 in the main square, he said: “A beautiful expression of St. Paul … is also a perfect spiritual portrait of St. Peter Celestine: ‘Far be it from me to glory, except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.’”

Later, meeting young people at Sulmona cathedral, where a mosaic showing Benedict with Celestine was unveiled, he praised those with the courage of conviction and recalled the pope whose rejection of the Holy See was seen by some as sinful:

“St. Celestine V,” he said, “Was able to act according to his conscience in obedience to God, hence without fear and with great courage even in difficult moments … not fearing to lose his dignity but knowing that it consists in existing in truth.”

He also defended Celestine’s retreat into seclusion: “In his choice of the hermit life might there not have been individualism or an escape from responsibility? This temptation does of course exist. But in the experiences approved by the Church, the solitary life of prayer and penance is always at the service of the community, open to others,” Benedict said.

“Hermits and monasteries are oases and sources of spiritual life from which all may draw.”

“ONE CAN RESIGN”

Three weeks after his Sunday in Sulmona, the pope was taking his summer retreat at the papal residence at Castelgandolfo, in the hills outside Rome, and spent hours talking to German journalist Peter Seewald between July 26 and 31.

As recorded in Seewald’s book of conversations “Light of the World”, the former Joseph Ratzinger was asked whether he might resign in the face of criticism over his handling of sexual abuse by priests: “When the danger is great one must not run away,” he said. “Now is certainly not the time to resign.

“One can resign at a peaceful moment, or when one simply cannot go on,” he added. “If a pope clearly realizes that he is no longer physically, psychologically and spiritually capable of handling the duties of his office, then he has a right and, under some circumstances, also an obligation to resign.”

Celestine’s founding of a great monastic order, his humility and piety, at a time when the Holy See was prey to the self-serving ambitions of Europe’s kings, earned him sainthood, even though some called his resignation at the age of about 80 a betrayal of God. A figure condemned to the antechamber of hell in Dante’s poem “Inferno” is sometimes identified as Celestine.

Most today would sympathize with his plight, however, and with the torment in Rome that drove him to renounce the papacy; in resigning, Celestine cited “legitimate reasons of humility and the weakness of my body” for seeking to recover “the consolations of my former life and lost tranquility”.

Or as his successor put it 719 years later, also in Latin: “My strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry … I renounce the ministry of Bishop of Rome, Successor of Saint Peter.

“I wish to also devotedly serve the Holy Church of God in the future through a life dedicated to prayer.”

Celestine survived only 18 months after stepping down, dying imprisoned by his successor who feared him as a rival. Some suspect he might even have been killed. Benedict will go to Castelgandolfo, then live in a convent inside the Vatican walls.

(Editing by Peter Graff)

That was a mirage. Libya, an ex-police state turned arms bazaar and now open for jihad, lies just 50 empty miles away. And in any case, the enemy was probably already inside the gates.

At least some of up to 70 Islamist guerrillas who stormed in before dawn on Wednesday launched their operation hours earlier, barreling over smugglers tracks across the Libyan border just after midnight, an Algerian security official told Reuters, citing evidence from mobile phones traced to the militants.

The ease with which they entered the fortified housing compound and nearby natural gas plant also left Algerians in little doubt the gunmen had allies among people at the site.

“They had local cooperation, I’m sure, maybe from drivers or security guards, who helped the terrorists get into the base,” said Anis Rahmani, editor of Algeria’s Ennahar newspaper and a writer on security issues who said he was briefed by officials.

Officials in this secretive country said they had discovered cases before when Islamist rebels succeeded in having fellow militants employed by international energy companies. One told Reuters it was possible insiders had cooperated at In Amenas.

Locally hired workers who escaped told Reuters of seeing the gunmen moving around the sprawling facility with confidence, apparently familiar with its layout and well prepared.

The militants said they launched the raid to halt French military intervention in neighboring Mali, which began a week ago, however the link is not yet clear. Several European and U.S. officials said the assault seems too elaborate to have been planned in such a short time.

It is possible the attack would have happened anyway, or that the French military operation provided a trigger to carry out an attack based on preparations done earlier.

Much may never become clear. The raid was carried out in a region closed to outsiders within a country whose government is unused to sharing sensitive information with the public.

First word of trouble came crackling over a walkie-talkie to the communications room at In Amenas, where a 27-year-old radio operator called Azedine logged a contact with a bus driver who, at 5:45 a.m. (0445 GMT), left to take some foreigners to the airstrip at the town of In Amenas, some 50 km (30 miles) away.

“Moments after the bus left, I heard shooting, a lot of shooting, and then nothing,” Azedine told Reuters on Friday.

Two people, one British, one Algerian were killed on two buses heading for the airport. It is not clear whether that incident was part of the plan that secured the militants access to the compound. Almost immediately after the bus skirmish, they were inside, in at least three vehicles.

People who have worked at the site, which sits with its back to cliffs in the dunes, say there was normally an overnight curfew on movement in the area, leaving it unclear how the gunmen were able to get so close before being challenged. Their initial approach may have been well off the main roads.

Freed hostages spoke of an alarm being raised, of frightened people staying in their offices or accommodation.

Azedine saw a gunman put on the ID badge of a French supervisor who had been shot dead.

Rapidly the area was surrounded by heavily armed Algerian troops, with tanks, armored vehicles and helicopter gunships from a nearby military base. The government in Algiers vowed never to negotiate.

SMUGGLERS’ TRAILS

People familiar with the site, operated by Britain’s BP and Statoil of Norway along with Algeria’s state energy company, said a barracks housing several hundred soldiers lies along the three km (two miles) of road separating the many buildings of the accommodation compound from the industrial plant.

A former senior Algerian government official said guards appeared to have been caught napping: “They have all kinds of equipment, detailed surveillance, cameras,” he said. “They were caught maybe at the right time, at five in the morning.”

But he also acknowledged the militants may have had help among the local workforce: “Out of 700 Algerians, I am sure they will find a couple who will cooperate. It always happens.”

Militant leaders like Taher Ben Cheneb, said by officials to have led the operation and to have been killed on Thursday, have stoked resentment among southerners at the way foreigners and northerners dominate the better paid jobs in the oil fields.

Ben Cheneb, described as a high school maths teacher in his 50s, led the Movement of the Islamic Youth in the South. Security expert Rahmani said he joined forces for this operation with followers of Mokhtar Belmokhtar, a veteran of Afghan wars and a leading figure in Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) who recently formed a new group named Mulathameen.

The two men had cooperated before, Rahmani said, notably in damaging an airliner in 2007 at Djanet, further to the south.

While Ben Cheneb’s group appeared to have moved on In Amenas from a base inside Algeria, Rahmani said, Belmokhtar’s men, led by Abu El Bara, appeared to have come in from Libya.

Noting the one-eyed Belmokhtar’s reputation as a cigarette smuggler as well as a holy warrior – locals call him the “Mister Marlboro” – he added: “They use the same backroads as the smugglers. You need a perfect knowledge of the Sahara to do it.

“They can use the same wells as the smugglers, the same fuel dumps hidden in the desert.”

More than a decade after Algeria’s civil war killed some 200,000 people, Islamist fighters roam the sandy wastes of Africa’s biggest country, mixing smuggling and kidnapping for ransom with opposition to the political establishment that has ruled in Algiers since French colonists left half a century ago.

These groups have been energized by the return of heavily armed ethnic Tuaregs and others from Libya, where they fought as mercenaries for Muammar Gaddafi until his overthrow in 2011. The new Libyan authorities are struggling to control their own deep south and it provides a launchpad for raids across the frontier.

Images from Libya’s civil war, of men in desert robes powering across the dunes in pick-up trucks mounted with heavy weapons ranging from machineguns to missile-launchers, have been transferred, along with arms and men, to conflict in the Sahara.

Mali’s army melted away last year, ceding control of northern towns like Timbuktu as fighters came back from Libya.

ARMY ASSAULT

While security forces seek to control their frontiers, the tracts of sand are vast, borders among the half dozen countries around the desert are unmarked, and the big money that can be made from illicit trade or kidnapping tourists and Western engineers can be used to buy favors from ill-paid officials.

Al Qaeda says it is fighting for a Muslim caliphate that transcends artificial borders in the Maghreb set by colonial powers.

Once inside the facility, militants, including bearded, ragged fighters and others in more urban dress, herded groups of Westerners together. Hundreds of Algerians were guarded more loosely. One Algerian worker told Reuters the gunmen said they were only interested in killing “Christians and infidels”.

Several former hostages described the attackers, from their accents, as appearing to be Libyan or Egyptian as well as Algerian. Officials said many of 18 dead gunmen were foreign.

Algeria told Western governments, which voiced dismay at the storming of the facility on Thursday, that troops moved in only because guerrillas were trying to leave with hostages, possibly hoping to reach the Malian border.

The captors loaded hostages into a convoy. Special forces backed by helicopters moved in around noon, some 30 hours after the plant was seized.

In what appears to have been the deadliest part of the siege, as described by the family of Irish survivor Stephen McFaul, government forces bombed the convoy, blasting apart four vehicles full of hostages. McFaul was in a fifth truck which crashed. He dashed for his life and escaped, and believes all those in the other vehicles were killed.

During Thursday, most of the hundreds of people at the site were able to flee.

By Friday night, it remained unclear how many of the gunmen and their hostages were still in the facility – though both groups might number in the dozens. Norway’s prime minister said the operation at the larger, residential compound seemed to be over and troops were now surrounding the industrial site.

But this left Western governments and intelligence officials, long used to difficult relations with Algeria which is proud of its sovereignty, desperate for hard facts about the fate of their nationals.

(Additional reporting by Alex Lawler and Jessica Donati in London; Editing by Peter Millership and Peter Graff)

That was a mirage. Libya, an ex-police state turned arms bazaar and now open for jihad, lies just 50 empty miles away. And in any case, the enemy was probably already inside the gates.

At least some of up to 70 Islamist guerrillas who stormed in before dawn on Wednesday launched their operation hours earlier, barrelling over smugglers tracks across the Libyan border just after midnight, an Algerian security official told Reuters, citing evidence from mobile phones traced to the militants.

The ease with which they entered the fortified housing compound and nearby natural gas plant also left Algerians in little doubt the gunmen had allies among people at the site.

“They had local cooperation, I’m sure, maybe from drivers or security guards, who helped the terrorists get into the base,” said Anis Rahmani, editor of Algeria’s Ennahar newspaper and a writer on security issues who said he was briefed by officials.

Officials in this secretive country said they had discovered cases before when Islamist rebels succeeded in having fellow militants employed by international energy companies. One told Reuters it was possible insiders had cooperated at In Amenas.

Locally hired workers who escaped told Reuters of seeing the gunmen moving around the sprawling facility with confidence, apparently familiar with its layout and well prepared.

The militants said they launched the raid to halt French military intervention in neighbouring Mali, which began a week ago, however the link is not yet clear. Several European and U.S. officials said the assault seems too elaborate to have been planned in such a short time.

It is possible the attack would have happened anyway, or that the French military operation provided a trigger to carry out an attack based on preparations done earlier.

Much may never become clear. The raid was carried out in a region closed to outsiders within a country whose government is unused to sharing sensitive information with the public.

First word of trouble came crackling over a walkie-talkie to the communications room at In Amenas, where a 27-year-old radio operator called Azedine logged a contact with a bus driver who, at 5:45 a.m. (0445 GMT), left to take some foreigners to the airstrip at the town of In Amenas, some 50 km (30 miles) away.

“Moments after the bus left, I heard shooting, a lot of shooting, and then nothing,” Azedine told Reuters on Friday.

Two people, one British, one Algerian were killed on two buses heading for the airport. It is not clear whether that incident was part of the plan that secured the militants access to the compound. Almost immediately after the bus skirmish, they were inside, in at least three vehicles.

People who have worked at the site, which sits with its back to cliffs in the dunes, say there was normally an overnight curfew on movement in the area, leaving it unclear how the gunmen were able to get so close before being challenged. Their initial approach may have been well off the main roads.

Freed hostages spoke of an alarm being raised, of frightened people staying in their offices or accommodation.

Azedine saw a gunman put on the ID badge of a French supervisor who had been shot dead.

Rapidly the area was surrounded by heavily armed Algerian troops, with tanks, armoured vehicles and helicopter gunships from a nearby military base. The government in Algiers vowed never to negotiate.

SMUGGLERS’ TRAILS

People familiar with the site, operated by Britain’s BP and Statoil of Norway along with Algeria’s state energy company, said a barracks housing several hundred soldiers lies along the three km (two miles) of road separating the many buildings of the accommodation compound from the industrial plant.

A former senior Algerian government official said guards appeared to have been caught napping: “They have all kinds of equipment, detailed surveillance, cameras,” he said. “They were caught maybe at the right time, at five in the morning.”

But he also acknowledged the militants may have had help among the local workforce: “Out of 700 Algerians, I am sure they will find a couple who will cooperate. It always happens.”

Militant leaders like Taher Ben Cheneb, said by officials to have led the operation and to have been killed on Thursday, have stoked resentment among southerners at the way foreigners and northerners dominate the better paid jobs in the oil fields.

Ben Cheneb, described as a high school maths teacher in his 50s, led the Movement of the Islamic Youth in the South. Security expert Rahmani said he joined forces for this operation with followers of Mokhtar Belmokhtar, a veteran of Afghan wars and a leading figure in Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) who recently formed a new group named Mulathameen.

The two men had cooperated before, Rahmani said, notably in damaging an airliner in 2007 at Djanet, further to the south.

While Ben Cheneb’s group appeared to have moved on In Amenas from a base inside Algeria, Rahmani said, Belmokhtar’s men, led by Abu El Bara, appeared to have come in from Libya.

Noting the one-eyed Belmokhtar’s reputation as a cigarette smuggler as well as a holy warrior – locals call him the “Mister Marlboro” – he added: “They use the same backroads as the smugglers. You need a perfect knowledge of the Sahara to do it.

“They can use the same wells as the smugglers, the same fuel dumps hidden in the desert.”

More than a decade after Algeria’s civil war killed some 200,000 people, Islamist fighters roam the sandy wastes of Africa’s biggest country, mixing smuggling and kidnapping for ransom with opposition to the political establishment that has ruled in Algiers since French colonists left half a century ago.

These groups have been energised by the return of heavily armed ethnic Tuaregs and others from Libya, where they fought as mercenaries for Muammar Gaddafi until his overthrow in 2011. The new Libyan authorities are struggling to control their own deep south and it provides a launch pad for raids across the frontier.

Images from Libya’s civil war, of men in desert robes powering across the dunes in pick-up trucks mounted with heavy weapons ranging from machineguns to missile-launchers, have been transferred, along with arms and men, to conflict in the Sahara.

Mali’s army melted away last year, ceding control of northern towns like Timbuktu as fighters came back from Libya.

ARMY ASSAULT

While security forces seek to control their frontiers, the tracts of sand are vast, borders among the half dozen countries around the desert are unmarked, and the big money that can be made from illicit trade or kidnapping tourists and Western engineers can be used to buy favours from ill-paid officials.

Al Qaeda says it is fighting for a Muslim caliphate that transcends artificial borders in the Maghreb set by colonial powers.

Once inside the facility, militants, including bearded, ragged fighters and others in more urban dress, herded groups of Westerners together. Hundreds of Algerians were guarded more loosely. One Algerian worker told Reuters the gunmen said they were only interested in killing “Christians and infidels”.

Several former hostages described the attackers, from their accents, as appearing to be Libyan or Egyptian as well as Algerian. Officials said many of 18 dead gunmen were foreign.

Algeria told Western governments, which voiced dismay at the storming of the facility on Thursday, that troops moved in only because guerrillas were trying to leave with hostages, possibly hoping to reach the Malian border.

The captors loaded hostages into a convoy. Special forces backed by helicopters moved in around noon, some 30 hours after the plant was seized.

In what appears to have been the deadliest part of the siege, as described by the family of Irish survivor Stephen McFaul, government forces bombed the convoy, blasting apart four vehicles full of hostages. McFaul was in a fifth truck which crashed. He dashed for his life and escaped, and believes all those in the other vehicles were killed.

During Thursday, most of the hundreds of people at the site were able to flee.

By Friday night, it remained unclear how many of the gunmen and their hostages were still in the facility – though both groups might number in the dozens. Norway’s prime minister said the operation at the larger, residential compound seemed to be over and troops were now surrounding the industrial site.

But this left Western governments and intelligence officials, long used to difficult relations with Algeria which is proud of its sovereignty, desperate for hard facts about the fate of their nationals.

(Additional reporting by Alex Lawler and Jessica Donati in London; Editing by Peter Millership and Peter Graff)

That was a mirage. Libya, an ex-police state turned arms
bazaar and now open for jihad, lies just 50 empty miles away.
And in any case, the enemy was probably already inside the
gates.

At least some of up to 70 Islamist guerrillas who stormed in
before dawn on Wednesday launched their operation hours earlier,
barrelling over smugglers tracks across the Libyan border just
after midnight, an Algerian security official told Reuters,
citing evidence from mobile phones traced to the militants.

The ease with which they entered the fortified housing
compound and nearby natural gas plant also left Algerians in
little doubt the gunmen had allies among people at the site.

“They had local cooperation, I’m sure, maybe from drivers or
security guards, who helped the terrorists get into the base,”
said Anis Rahmani, editor of Algeria’s Ennahar newspaper and a
writer on security issues who said he was briefed by officials.

Officials in this secretive country said they had discovered
cases before when Islamist rebels succeeded in having fellow
militants employed by international energy companies. One told
Reuters it was possible insiders had cooperated at In Amenas.

Locally hired workers who escaped told Reuters of seeing the
gunmen moving around the sprawling facility with confidence,
apparently familiar with its layout and well prepared.

The militants said they launched the raid to halt French
military intervention in neighbouring Mali, which began a week
ago, however the link is not yet clear. Several European and
U.S. officials said the assault seems too elaborate to have been
planned in such a short time.

It is possible the attack would have happened anyway, or
that the French military operation provided a trigger to carry
out an attack based on preparations done earlier.

Much may never become clear. The raid was carried out in a
region closed to outsiders within a country whose government is
unused to sharing sensitive information with the public.

First word of trouble came crackling over a walkie-talkie to
the communications room at In Amenas, where a 27-year-old radio
operator called Azedine logged a contact with a bus driver who,
at 5:45 a.m. (0445 GMT), left to take some foreigners to the
airstrip at the town of In Amenas, some 50 km (30 miles) away.

“Moments after the bus left, I heard shooting, a lot of
shooting, and then nothing,” Azedine told Reuters on Friday.

Two people, one British, one Algerian were killed on two
buses heading for the airport. It is not clear whether that
incident was part of the plan that secured the militants access
to the compound. Almost immediately after the bus skirmish, they
were inside, in at least three vehicles.

People who have worked at the site, which sits with its back
to cliffs in the dunes, say there was normally an overnight
curfew on movement in the area, leaving it unclear how the
gunmen were able to get so close before being challenged. Their
initial approach may have been well off the main roads.

Freed hostages spoke of an alarm being raised, of frightened
people staying in their offices or accommodation.

Azedine saw a gunman put on the ID badge of a French
supervisor who had been shot dead.

Rapidly the area was surrounded by heavily armed Algerian
troops, with tanks, armoured vehicles and helicopter gunships
from a nearby military base. The government in Algiers vowed
never to negotiate.

SMUGGLERS’ TRAILS

People familiar with the site, operated by Britain’s BP and
Statoil of Norway along with Algeria’s state energy company,
said a barracks housing several hundred soldiers lies along the
three km (two miles) of road separating the many buildings of
the accommodation compound from the industrial plant.

A former senior Algerian government official said guards
appeared to have been caught napping: “They have all kinds of
equipment, detailed surveillance, cameras,” he said. “They were
caught maybe at the right time, at five in the morning.”

But he also acknowledged the militants may have had help
among the local workforce: “Out of 700 Algerians, I am sure they
will find a couple who will cooperate. It always happens.”

Militant leaders like Taher Ben Cheneb, said by officials to
have led the operation and to have been killed on Thursday, have
stoked resentment among southerners at the way foreigners and
northerners dominate the better paid jobs in the oil fields.

Ben Cheneb, described as a high school maths teacher in his
50s, led the Movement of the Islamic Youth in the South.
Security expert Rahmani said he joined forces for this operation
with followers of Mokhtar Belmokhtar, a veteran of Afghan wars
and a leading figure in Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM)
who recently formed a new group named Mulathameen.

The two men had cooperated before, Rahmani said, notably in
damaging an airliner in 2007 at Djanet, further to the south.

While Ben Cheneb’s group appeared to have moved on In Amenas
from a base inside Algeria, Rahmani said, Belmokhtar’s men, led
by Abu El Bara, appeared to have come in from Libya.

Noting the one-eyed Belmokhtar’s reputation as a cigarette
smuggler as well as a holy warrior – locals call him the “Mister
Marlboro” – he added: “They use the same backroads as the
smugglers. You need a perfect knowledge of the Sahara to do it.

“They can use the same wells as the smugglers, the same fuel
dumps hidden in the desert.”

More than a decade after Algeria’s civil war killed some
200,000 people, Islamist fighters roam the sandy wastes of
Africa’s biggest country, mixing smuggling and kidnapping for
ransom with opposition to the political establishment that has
ruled in Algiers since French colonists left half a century ago.

These groups have been energised by the return of heavily
armed ethnic Tuaregs and others from Libya, where they fought as
mercenaries for Muammar Gaddafi until his overthrow in 2011. The
new Libyan authorities are struggling to control their own deep
south and it provides a launchpad for raids across the frontier.

Images from Libya’s civil war, of men in desert robes
powering across the dunes in pick-up trucks mounted with heavy
weapons ranging from machineguns to missile-launchers, have been
transferred, along with arms and men, to conflict in the Sahara.

Mali’s army melted away last year, ceding control of
northern towns like Timbuktu as fighters came back from Libya.

ARMY ASSAULT

While security forces seek to control their frontiers, the
tracts of sand are vast, borders among the half dozen countries
around the desert are unmarked, and the big money that can be
made from illicit trade or kidnapping tourists and Western
engineers can be used to buy favours from ill-paid officials.

Al Qaeda says it is fighting for a Muslim caliphate that
transcends artificial borders in the Maghreb set by colonial
powers.

Once inside the facility, militants, including bearded,
ragged fighters and others in more urban dress, herded groups of
Westerners together. Hundreds of Algerians were guarded more
loosely. One Algerian worker told Reuters the gunmen said they
were only interested in killing “Christians and infidels”.

Several former hostages described the attackers, from their
accents, as appearing to be Libyan or Egyptian as well as
Algerian. Officials said many of 18 dead gunmen were foreign.

Algeria told Western governments, which voiced dismay at the
storming of the facility on Thursday, that troops moved in only
because guerrillas were trying to leave with hostages, possibly
hoping to reach the Malian border.

The captors loaded hostages into a convoy. Special forces
backed by helicopters moved in around noon, some 30 hours after
the plant was seized.

In what appears to have been the deadliest part of the
siege, as described by the family of Irish survivor Stephen
McFaul, government forces bombed the convoy, blasting apart four
vehicles full of hostages. McFaul was in a fifth truck which
crashed. He dashed for his life and escaped, and believes all
those in the other vehicles were killed.

During Thursday, most of the hundreds of people at the site
were able to flee.

By Friday night, it remained unclear how many of the gunmen
and their hostages were still in the facility – though both
groups might number in the dozens. Norway’s prime minister said
the operation at the larger, residential compound seemed to be
over and troops were now surrounding the industrial site.

But this left Western governments and intelligence
officials, long used to difficult relations with Algeria which
is proud of its sovereignty, desperate for hard facts about the
fate of their nationals.