DATE=2/15/2000
TYPE=CORRESPONDENT REPORT
TITLE=ALGERIA VIOLENCE (L-ONLY)
NUMBER=2-259171
BYLINE=LISA BRYANT
DATELINE=CAIRO
CONTENT=
VOICED AT:
INTRO: At least 16 people have died and 20 have been
injured in an attack in western Algeria -- in the
latest flare-up of violence to hit the North African
country. From Cairo, Lisa Bryant reports that the
attacks come almost a month after Algeria's president
vowed war against armed groups that refused to sign
onto his peace plan.
TEXT: Algerian newspapers offered conflicting
reports on the number of dead and wounded in western
Algeria, where Islamic rebels allegedly fired on two
buses as they stopped at a roadblock on Monday.
///Opt/// The French language newspaper, Le Matin,
reported Tuesday that sixteen people were killed and
30 wounded during the ambush, and that some of the
attackers finished off their victims with knives. But
the Arabic language, Al Khabar, newspaper reports that
14 people were killed and 20 wounded. ///end opt///
The attack, which has been blamed on Islamist
extremists, took place near the town of Khemis
Miliana, about 90 kilometers west of the country's
capital, Algiers. It is only the latest in a series of
violent assaults that have targeted government
security forces and ordinary Algerians.
On Monday, newspapers reported that three members of
Algeria's military and one militant were among five
people who died in fighting between rebels and
security officers in the eastern region of Tizi Ouzou.
The press also reported that at least 23 people died
in separate attacks last week.
Such news remains standard fare in Algeria, despite
the government's assertion that hundreds of Islamist
militants have laid down their arms in an amnesty plan
proposed by President Abdelaziz Bouteflika last year.
That includes one of Algeria's main rebel groups, the
Islamic Salvation Army, or A-I-S. But another militant
group, known as the G-I-A, has so far refused to agree
to the president's peace plan.
Algeria has been racked by violence since 1992, when
Islamist rebels declared war against the state after
the government cancelled national elections that an
Islamic party seemed poised to win.
Last summer, President Bouteflika declared full or
partial amnesty for rebels who lay down their arms by
January 13th. Although the plan won overwhelming
support in a September referendum, some Algerians have
protested the idea of pardoning the rebel fighters.
(SIGNED)
NEB/LB/GE/JO
15-Feb-2000 10:04 AM EDT (15-Feb-2000 1504 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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