News from Algeria 2007

[Al-khiyal]

Man blows himself up in Morocco Web cafe

Moroccan authorities carried out a wave of arrests on Monday after a suicide bomber blew himself up in a Casablanca cybercafe, injuring four people.

State news agency MAP identified the dead man as Abdelfettah Raydi, a Moroccan sentenced to five years in jail for terrorist offences in 2003 but granted a royal pardon two years later.

A witness said he blew himself up after a quarrel with the supervisor of a cybercafe in the working-class Sidi Moumen district, where the suicide bombers for the 2003 Casablanca attacks that killed 45 people were recruited.

Police caught his suspected accomplice, who fled after being lightly injured in the Sunday evening blast, and said he too had been carrying explosives. MAP identified the man as Youssef Khoudri and said he was still in hospital.

In the wake of the apparently unplanned attack, police made several arrests in the area, a senior official said without specifying an exact number.

The bomber and his suspected accomplice, born in 1984 and 1989 respectively, had been trying to access the Internet for instructions on where to carry out bomb attacks in another part of Casablanca, police said overnight Sunday.

The blast was the first in the port city since 45 people were killed, including 12 suicide bombers, and dozens injured in five separate attacks on the same day in May 2003.

One of those injured in Sunday's explosion said in a television interview on Monday that the charge went off after a row that started when the cafe supervisor, Mohammed, yelled at the bomber "because he was typing too hard".

"At first, he switched computers, but he soon began bashing very hard again, and then Mohammed decided to pull down the shutter and call the police," said the casualty, whose head was wrapped in a bandage.

Both men apologised and begged the supervisor to let them out, the witness continued, adding that he and other clients had in vain asked the owner to release them.

"One of them tried to open an exit, but he was stopped by Mohammed ... It was at that moment that I heard the explosion that burned my hair and sent my jacket up in flames," he said. "I couldn't see anything else."

According to a police official, "one of the two individuals was ... blown apart by explosives hidden under his clothes and died on the spot".

The elderly owner of the cafe, who did not give his name but who is the father of supervisor Mohammed, said the attack had left him dazed, recalling: "In one corner, my son was stretched out on the floor.

"In the other was the body of the suicide bomber: without a head, the limbs detached and the stomach crushed. It was hideous."

Moroccan officials have regularly announced in 2006 and 2007 the dismantlement of terrorist cells in the country.

No one has so far claimed responsibility for Sunday's attack.

Casablanca suicide bomb prompts several arrests

[Al-khiyal]

Skikda-based police officer implicated in illicit migrant smuggling network

[Al-khiyal]

March 13 (Bloomberg) -- Extremists may attack a commercial airliner carrying Western workers in Algeria, the U.S. Embassy in the capital, Algiers, said.

The embassy gave the warning in a statement on its Web site, without saying where it obtained the information. "At this time, there is no additional information available as to the specific carrier or the timing of this attack,'' the embassy said.

Algeria, Africa's largest gas producer, has been gripped by a civil war between Islamic militants and the military-backed government since 1992. At least 100,000 people have died and 6,000 have disappeared since then, according to the New York- based Human Rights Watch.

The U.S. State Department updated its travel warning for Algeria on December 20, advising Americans that "the threat from terrorism in many areas continues to pose a significant security risk.''

On December 10, a bomb attack on a bus carrying workers from a U.S. company killed an Algerian driver and wounded four Britons, two Lebanese citizens, an American, a Canadian and an Algerian. An Algerian group that now says it's affiliated with al-Qaeda took responsibility for the attack in a video shown on the Internet.

The al-Qaeda Organization in the Islamic Maghreb, previously called the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, announced its al-Qaeda link in January. The group also took responsibility for bombings that killed six people and injured 12 in several towns east of Algiers in February.

U.S. embassy warns of attack on airliner in Algeria

[Al-khiyal]

ALGIERS (Reuters) - Militants may be planning to attack commercial aircraft in Algeria, the U.S. and British governments told nationals living in the oil- and gas-exporting North African country.

A U.S. embassy warden's message dated March 12 said: "There is information that extremists may be planning to conduct an attack against a commercial aircraft carrying Western workers in Algeria."

A similar Britain travel advice statement dated March 13 said: "We are aware of reports that terrorists may be planning to carry out attacks against aircraft flying into Algeria. We are liaising with the local authorities."

Islamist rebels have attacked foreigners working in Algeria's lifeline energy sector twice in recent months and have also stepped up a campaign of bombings against Algerian police.

In the first attack on foreigners, on December 10, insurgents set off a roadside bomb on the outskirts of Algiers beside a bus carrying Western oil workers, including Americans and Britons, killing an Algerian and a Lebanese and wounding four others.

The second attack, on March 3, 130 km (80 miles) southwest of Algiers, on a bus carrying workers for a Russian gas pipeline construction firm, killed three Algerians and a Russian.

The attacks were claimed by the al Qaeda Organisation of the Islamic Maghreb, a group of Algerian Islamist rebels formerly known as the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC) who adopted the new name in January to deepen ties to al Qaeda.

The attacks on foreigners, plus a spate of other bombings in urban areas, are a sharp change from the GSPC's habitual small-scale kidnappings, ambushes, fake roadblocks and assassinations in remote rural areas.

"The threat from terrorism in many areas continues to pose a significant security risk," the U.S State Department's standing travel advice for Algeria says.

"Security in Algiers has been stepped up sharply in recent weeks, with increased roadblocks and vehicle searches across the city and plainclothes police stopping and questioning pedestrians in some areas."

Some security analysts say the GSPC wants to transform itself from a domestic rebellion in Algeria, where it is under pressure from security forces, into an international force capable of striking in both North Africa and in Europe.

Founded in 1998, the GSPC began as an offshoot of another armed group that was waging an armed revolt against the government to establish an Islamic state.

The GSPC has shared the overall aims of that revolt, which began in 1992 after the then military-backed authorities, fearing an Iran-style revolution, scrapped a parliamentary election that an Islamist political party was set to win.

Up to 200,000 people were killed in the ensuing bloodshed.

Foreign workers warned over possible Algeria attack

[Al-khiyal]

U.S. Embassy Algiers, Warden message, March 12th 2007

.pdf file

[Al-khiyal]

Algeria and Spain on Tuesday signed six cooperation agreements to enhance bilateral ties during a state visit by Spanish King Juan Carlos I, Algeria's official news agency reported.

Both the Spanish king and Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika attended the signing ceremony of the documents which cover civil aviation, salvage operations, immigration, measures against maritime pollution, finance and parliamentary exchanges.

The king arrived here on Tuesday for a three-day visit, which he said would present "a new opportunity to strengthen the ties of friendship and cooperation ... and also enable us to personally witness the great progress that has been made by Algeria."

The Spanish king also said that his last state visit to Algeria in 1983 left "a very enduring impression."

During their talks, President Bouteflika and the Spanish king stressed the need to strengthen dialogue and cooperation between the two countries in view of the complicated situation on the world arena.

They expressed satisfaction with the smooth development in the bilateral relations since the signing of an agreement to enhance good-neighborly ties, friendship and cooperation in 2002.

The two countries signed an extradition treaty in December last year on a joint fight against terrorism and organized crimes.

There are many Algerians living in Spain, with some reportedly involved in terrorism and organized crimes. The extradition treaty aims to tackle the issue which would otherwise hinder the furthering of ties.

The two countries are also tightly bound by energy, as Algeria supplies 60 percent of Spain's natural gas.

Algeria, Spain sign agreements on aviation, pollution, immigration

[Al-khiyal]

Madrid - The disputed status of Western Sahara, the former Spanish colony ruled by Morocco, will never be a cause for war between Rabat and Algiers, said Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika on Tuesday in the El Pais newspaper.

Morocco has proposed self-government for the Western Sahara under Moroccan sovereignty, rather than a referendum on independence as supported by the Algerian-backed Polisario Front.

However, Bouteflika sought to dispel any fears the issue would ever spark a military conflict between the two North African neighbours.

"I have said it several times: Never will the issue of the Sahara constitute a casus belli between Algeria and Morocco," which annexed the territory on Spain's withdrawal in 1975.

At the same time, Bouteflika said renewed hostilities between the Polisario Front and Morocco "cannot be ruled out" if a diplomatic solution fails to materialise.

'Free and fair referendum on independence'

The Algerian leader was speaking hours before Spain's King Juan Carlos began a state visit to Algeria and three months after Bouteflika asked Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero to push for the organisation of "a free and fair referendum on independence" for Western Sahara.

Rabat is next month due to unveil its plans to grant autonomy within Moroccan sovereignty at the UN security council, a plan the Polisario Front has rejected as it would close the door on the option of independence.

For Bouteflika, "no unilateral solution is viable. Only the recognition of the right of the Sahrawi people to self-determination can resolve the problem.

"That is the position reaffirmed by the United Nations," he told El Pais, stressing that Spanish and Algerian "positions on the issue of Western Sahara diverge a little".

In a March 6 statement which followed a Moroccan-Spanish summit Spain said it was studying with "interest" Rabat's autonomy proposal which Madrid believed could "open up a new dynamic for dialogue to overcome the current impasse".

That positive view dismayed Algiers.

However, Spanish foreign minister Miguel Angel Moratinos commented in Tuesday's El Pais that "Spain's position has not changed one iota.

"The resolution of the conflict in Western Sahara must be just, definitive, mutually acceptable and respect the principle of self-determination for the Sahrawi people."

Algeria won't fight over Sahara