Connect to share and comment  Armed Islamists vow to continue
fight in Mali   An armed Islamist group which occupied northern
Mali last year vowed Tuesday to continue its fight to drive out
the French and African troops that routed it in a lightning
military operation in January.  Ansar Dine, Arabic for
"defenders of the faith", was one of three militant
organisations to take advantage of the disarray following a coup
to claim control of Mali's vast northern desert, imposing a
brutal form of sharia law in its cities.  "We reassure our
parents in Mali, particularly in Azawad (northern Mali), that
their sons within Ansar Dine are in a good situation, resist by
the grace of Allah and continue to lead the fighting under the
command of Iyad Ag Ghaly, who is doing well," the group said in
a statement published by Mauritanian news portal Sahara Media.
Ag Ghaly, an ethnic Tuareg rebel who gave up a career as a high-
level diplomat to take up arms, founded Ansar Dine early last
year, but unconfirmed reports claim he h