A lack of support by Algeria for military operations against Al-Qaeda in the north African Sahel region has been a serious setback for joint efforts, according to officials and experts.

At the opening Monday in Mali's capital of a meeting of general staff chiefs of Mali, Algeria, Mauritania and Niger, General Gabriel Poudiougou, head of Mali's army, insisted on the need for joint actions against Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).

"We must recognise that up against a transnational enemy, which is well organised and disposes of enormous financial and material means, we need to develop further our capacity to carry out joint multinational operations," Poudiougou said.

In his view, the Committee of the Operational Joint General Staff (CEMOC), which includes the army chiefs of the four countries most affected by AQIM's activities, is "a tool whose full potential we should use, especially since we have recently noted a dangerous link between the terrorists and certain extremist sects," like Boko Haram in Nigeria.

The CEMOC, based at Tamanrasset in southern Algeria and with an intelligence centre in Algiers, was set up in April 2010 to coordinate better the fight against AQIM. It meets every six months, but has not yet launched joint cross-border operations.

However, several delegates to the Bamako meeting, requesting anonymity, told AFP that they considered Algeria was to blame for this lack of action.

A delegate from Niger noted that "the Algerian army, on its own, has more resources than the armies of Niger, Mali and Mauritania" put together, adding that, "I don't understand why they don't venture on to the terrain to help us fight against AQIM."

A diplomat, also from Niger, said that "the budget of the Algerian army is six times bigger than the national budget of a country like Mauritania. The ball is in Algeria's camp."

"While waiting for it to decide really to take the lead in the anti-AQIM coalition, our states will continue to develop their security ties, on one hand with Algeria, and on the other with other indispensable countries like Morocco and France," he added.

A Malian civil servant in the interior ministry said, "That Algeria decides to give us weapons to fight against AQIM is fine, but as long as it won't go on to the terrain to see other African countries at our sides, AQIM will gain ground, and we shall see who profits from this situation."

"For lack of means, the Sahel has today become a no man's land," he added, stating that up against former allies of late Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi, "who come and go between their country and the Sahel, with guns in circulation, Algeria doesn't need our green light to step in. It should do it straight away, especially since the Islamists come from Algeria."

AQIM grew out of Algeria's Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, which took part in a low-level civil war at home that has now ended. Since 2007, AQIM has launched a range of operations in the Sahel strip south of the Sahara, a vast zone that includes all four CEMOC countries.

Operating from bases in northern Mali, the radical Islamists have carried out attacks against troops and civilians, kidnappings, particularly of Westerners, of whom several have been executed.

AQIM is also engaged in trafficking of various kinds, including weapons and drugs.

Faced with criticism of Algeria's reticence to get more involved, an Algerian officer in Bamako stated that the constitution of his country was very clear. "It is not up to us to intervene militarily on a different territory, or in any event, it isn't easy."

The return to Mali and Niger of thousands of fighters who had served Kadhafi's regime in Libya, most of them Tuaregs, has raised the security stakes in this troubled region, which is hard to monitor and control. Most of these men have guns, including heavy weaponry.