Al-Qaida says it set off today's bombs in Algeria
Associated Press ^ | April 11, 2007 | AOMAR OUALI
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CAIRO, Egypt — Al-Qaida's wing in North Africa today claimed responsibility for the two bombings in Algeria that have killed at least 23 people, Al-Jazeera reported.
The broadcaster said it received a telephone call from a spokesman for al-Qaida in North Africa, saying the group carried out the blasts.
Earlier today, bombs heavily damaged the prime minister's office and a police station, killing at least 23 people and wounding about 160, the country's official news agency said.
Prime Minister Abdelaziz Belkhadem, who was unhurt, said that militants — believed to be linked to al-Qaida — were responsible for the "cowardly, criminal terrorist act" as he spoke to reporters outside his wrecked offices.
The attacks were a devastating setback for the North African nation's efforts to close the chapter on its Islamic insurgency that has killed 200,000 people. After years of relative calm, an al-Qaida affiliate has recently waged several smaller attacks in the oil- and gas-rich nation.
Belkhadem declined to say how many had been killed or wounded.
The official APS agency said at least 23 people were killed and 160 wounded in the two attacks, but gave no breakdown. The other bombing targeted the police station of Bab Ezzouar, east of the capital, Algiers, on the road to its airport.
A charred, wrecked car lay on the pavement about 98 feet from the gates of the government building — a modern white, block-like high-rise that also houses the Interior Ministry. It was not immediately clear if the car had been involved in the bombing.
Police cordoned off stairs leading up to the government building with orange police tape, and paramedics raced up the steps with stretchers. Paramedics escorted a man with blood on his head into an ambulance. Another woman, looking dazed and in tears, was checked for head injuries.
The explosion at about 10:45 local time caused windows to rattle at least a half-mile away. Few details were immediately available about the other attack east of the capital.
Algeria's insurgency broke out in 1992, after the army canceled legislative elections that an Islamic party appeared set to win.
Since then, violence related to the insurgency has left an estimated 200,000 dead — civilians, soldiers and Islamic fighters — according to the government. Algeria's military led a crackdown on militants hiding out in the country's brush and mountains, while the government tried to reconcile the nation with several amnesty offers to militants willing to turn in their weapons.
Belkhadem expressed bitterness at insurgents who refused the amnesty offers.
"The Algerian people stretched out a hand to them, and they respond with a terrorist act," he said.
Large-scale violence died down in the late 1990s, but skirmishes have surged in recent months as an al-Qaida affiliate carried out a deadly and carefully planned series of bomb attacks. Several targeted foreign workers.
A March 3 bombing of a bus carrying workers for a Russian company killed a Russian engineer and three Algerians. A December attack near Algiers and targeting a bus carrying foreign employees of an affiliate of Halliburton killed an Algerian and a Lebanese citizen.
Al-Qaida in Islamic North Africa — the new name for the Salafist Group for Call and Combat, known by its French abbreviation GSPC — claimed responsibility for both of those attacks. |
