UNITED NATIONS — U.N. specialists say the predominant view amongst member nations is that the management of al-Qaida has handed to Sayf al-’Adl, who was liable for Osama bin Laden’s safety and educated a few of the hijackers concerned within the 9/11 assault on the U.S.

The panel of specialists stated in a report back to the U.N. Safety Council circulated Monday that no announcement has been made from Sayf al-’Adl changing Ayman al-Zawahri, who was killed by a U.S. drone strike in Kabul final August.

“However in discussions in November and December many U.N. member states took the view that Sayf al-’Adl is already working because the de facto and uncontested chief of the group,” the report says.

Assessments range as to why al-’Adl’s management hasn’t been declared, it stated.

Some international locations really feel that al-Zawahri’s presence in Kabul embarrassed the nation’s Taliban rulers who’re looking for legitimacy “and that al-Qaida selected to not exacerbate this by acknowledging the dying,” the specialists stated.

“Nonetheless, most judged a key issue to be the continued presence of Sayf al-’Adl within the Islamic Republic of Iran (which) raised troublesome theological and operational questions for al-Qaida,” they stated.

Whereas noting that one nation rejected claims that any al-Qaida affiliate is in Iran, the panel stated that the situation of Sayf al-’Adl’a “raises questions which have a bearing on al-Qaida’s ambitions to claim management of a worldwide motion within the face of challenges” from the Islamic State extremist group.

Sayf al-’Adl has been listed on the U.N. sanctions blacklist as Egyptian-born Mohammed Salahaldin Abd El Halim Zidan since January 2001, the panel stated. He’s described within the U.N. itemizing as taking up as navy commander of al-Qaida following the dying of Mohammed Atef — one in every of bin Laden’s prime aides — in a U.S. assault in November 2001.

Along with being bin Laden’s safety chief, the U.N. says, Sayf al-’Adl taught militants to make use of explosives and educated a few of the hijackers concerned within the assault in the USA on Sept. 11, 2001. It says he additionally educated Somali fighters who killed 18 U.S. servicemen in Mogadishu, Somalia, in 1993.

Sayf al-’Adl is needed by U.S. authorities in reference to the August 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya.

In keeping with the report, the menace from al-Qaida, the Islamic State extremist group and their associates “stays excessive in battle zones and neighboring international locations,” with Africa rising lately “because the continent the place the hurt completed by terrorism is growing most quickly and extensively.”

The panel stated the Islamic State’s management has additionally develop into a query following the group’s Nov. 30 announcement that Abu al-Hassan al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi had died in a battle the earlier month, the group’s second chief to be killed in 2022.

“The brand new chief was introduced as Abu al-Husain al-Husaini al-Qurashi, and his true id just isn’t but recognized,” the specialists stated.

Member states famous quite a few pledges of allegiance to Abu al-Husain by Islamic Stater “associates far and large with out particular information of his id or qualities as a frontrunner,” they stated.