WASHINGTON, Jan 13, 2011 (AFP) - An Al-Qaeda leader expressed support Thursday for protesters in Tunisia's deadly unrest, urging violent jihad to overthrow the "tyrant" president, a monitoring group said.

In a 13-minute video posted on jihadist forums, the leader of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, Abu Musab Abdul Wadud, also gave strategic advice and urged protesters to "send their sons to us to receive training with weapons and to gain military experience," the US-based SITE Monitoring Service said.

"On behalf of your mujahedeen brothers we offer our support and consolation to you and our help to you in your affliction and your uprising, with advice, incitement and support," Wadud was quoted as saying in his recorded statement.

He blasted President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali for corruption and Muslim oppression, and said protesters should overthrow the leader and establish Islamic Sharia law in the North African nation.

Tunisia has been rocked by weeks of violent anti-government protests. At least 66 people have been killed in the unrest, according to a Paris-based rights group which branded the crackdown an "ongoing massacre."

Witnesses said police opened fire on demonstrators in the Tunisian capital Thursday, killing at least one person.

Wadud said in his message that Tunisian Muslims should expand their uprising nationwide, and recognize their fight is a legitimate opposition to a "corrupt, criminal and tyrannical regime," and that it reflect similar Islamic uprisings across the region.

"It is a type of injustice (in Tunisia) that should be dealt with in all ways of condemnations including jihad with ones' lives," Wadud said.

According to experts, AQIM bases are spread across Algeria, Mauritania and Mali.

Stressing that "your disaster is our disaster and your affliction is our affliction," Wadud indirectly warned that AQIM was seeking to act against Tunisian authorities.

"We will retaliate against your torturers and their masters sooner or later, with permission from Allah, and we will do all that is possible to help you as long as our eyes blink and blood courses through our veins," he said.

"If you die with dignity and honor while prohibiting vice and doing jihad against the Tunisian tyrant and his masters with all the legitimate means that are available to you, that is 1,000 times better than living in humiliation, cowardice and subjugation."

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Copyright AFP 2011.